They Watched
by celohei
Summary: Panem watched as a girl volunteered to save her sister. The Capitol watched as she became the Girl on Fire and the star-crossed lover of her fellow tribute. The Districts watched as a little girl made the Capitol blink and bend. Panem watched as she became the Mockingjay and set the world ablaze. But some people watched the girl more closely. What did they see? (Lot of characters)
1. Chapter 1 - Greasy Sae

_Hello people !_

 _So this is a new story. It's my first Hunger Games fic so we'll see how it turns out. I've had this vague idea of a story floating around in my mind for years but could never managed to put it into words. I read the books once more this month and also read a few fics to satisfy my curiosity and to see if it would trigger my imagination into actually imagining something. Here is the result. It is not exactly what I first had in mind but I actually like this better. Let's see..._

 _ **Full summary** : Panem watched as a girl volunteered to save her sister. The Capitol watched as she bacame the Girl on Fire and the star-crossed lover of her fellow tribute. The Districts watched as a little girl made the Capitol blink and bend. Panem watched as she became the MockingJay and set the world ablaze. But some people watched the girl more closely. What did they see? This could be read as a story or as a collection of oneshots. The chapters/OS will have different styles but they will all more or less be in chronological order, possibly with a few overlaps. Their length will vary greatly._

 _(Oh and I don't own any part of Suzan Collins' work: this is a fanfiction website, obviously I'm not the real deal. It shouldn't even need mentioning.)_

 _(Oh again: English is my second language, not my first, so I'm sorry for any mistake.)_

* * *

 **They Watched**

Greasy Sae watched the man become a father. The man was a miner. And a hunter. According to the laws of Panem he was a criminal. But here, where even the Peacekeepers' stomachs were growling with hunger, he was just a man. A happy man – or as happy as one could be here, in the Seam, in District 12.

Greasy Sae watched the man raise his daughter. She was just like him, in more ways than one, that little piece of life. She watched as the girl smiled at her singing father.

Greasy Sae watched as the girl became a sister. There was a new flower in the little family. As fair as her namesake.

The little girls grew, the eldest laughing a bit less, serious but happy. And strong. Like her father.

Greasy Sae watched as the girls became orphans. The mine took both their parents one day. One was claimed by fire, along with other fathers. The other was taken by pain, grief, loneliness and despair.

So Greasy Sae watched the flowers lose their smiles. And their flesh. She watched as they were losing their lives, little by little, day by day. Until Greasy Sae knew that she would soon have to watch the sisters become flowers, for real this time, when they would sleep in the carbon dust-saturated ground. Like flowers in autumn they were withering away.

But Greasy Sae watched the eldest cling back to life. She watched as she took her sister back from starvation's clutches, then hunger's, slowly. Greasy Sae watched their bones disappear beneath flesh again. Life came back. But the eldest had not regained her smile. She only gave it to her sister. She became a hunter, like her father.

Greasy Sae watched as the girl who had lost her smile became a friend. A friend to another boy who had lost a father to the mine. Slowly the girl started smiling again. Soon the boy and the girl started coming to Greasy Sae with meat and to others with wild fruits.

Greasy Sae watched the girl go after she thanked her for the soup. That girl. No. Greasy Sae had watched her cease to be just a girl. Not a woman yet. Not in the usual sense of the word. Yet, in a way, she was. That girl-woman who carried the life of her small family on her shoulders. She was strong but Greasy Sae knew that she was also fragile, in her own way.

Greasy Sae shook her head and went back to cleaning the girl's bowl. She had no time to watch the world now. Tomorrow she would have to watch as two children would leave their home, never to return. She knew. She had watched children being taken away for the last 23 years.


	2. Chapter 2 - Finnick

_Hello, people !_

 _So here is the second chapter (yes, already). It's way longer than the first. And the style is different, too._

 _Don't expect such quick an update for the next one, for several reasons. First, I'm not done writing it yet. Second, I wasn't planning on posting the second chapter that early but the first is so short that I finally decide to post it anyway (really the first is more a teaser than a real chapter...). Third, I have a lot of work to do in the coming weeks for university, even though it's the summer. And after that I'll be moving literally to the other side of the planet so I don't know how much time I'll have to write. Probably not a lot._

 _I'll try to update soon anyway, if only because writing this is actually a good way to take breaks from my uni related work._

 _I hope you enjoy !_

 _xx_

 _[ **chapter update** : it's not an update, just correcting a few typos]_

* * *

 _ **They Watched**_

 **Finnick**

"-I volunteer!"

Finnick's head snapped up to the screen on the wall of the train wagon that was taking him, two of his fellow victors and the two tributes they would be mentoring from District 4 to the Capitol. He had been distractedly tying knots on a length of rope while his fellow mentors were trying to learn more about their new charges. None of them really had been watching the television where the reapings of the double-digit districts were now broadcasted live. The four other people in the room briefly looked at the screen, barely a couple of seconds, before resuming their talk. But not Finnick. He watched, slightly intrigued, as a young brown-hair girl detached herself from some Peacekeepers and repeated what she had just said, her back straight and her voice strong and clear.

"-I volunteer as tribute!"

Finnick smirked then stood up and went to the buffet to pick one of the sugary pastries before sitting back down and finally getting involved in the conversation between mentors and tributes.

How rare, a volunteer from a lesser district! And 12, no less. Maybe this year's Games would turn out to be interesting. But he doubted it.

* * *

Finnick looked around him at the other mentors. Not all of them were there but it was never the case. The room he was in was one of the thirteen mentoring rooms in the Training center. Twelve individual ones – one for each district – and one bigger, common one where mentors could watch the Games together.

The Games wouldn't start for another two weeks but mentors liked to meet here to discuss things and salute one another.

Finnick had decided to come to pick up the mood of these Games. So far it seemed that there would be no surprise. But Finnick, perhaps more than anyone, knew that there always was the potentiality for big surprises.

Half an hour before the Opening ceremony started, mentor and victor Haymitch Abernathy staggered in, drunk as usual. He was far from being the only victor with an addiction but a part of Finnick expected him to maybe go easy of the alcohol this year, if only because the girl tribute seemed to have more of a back bone than his usual tributes. Finnick didn't quite know what to make of an as-drunk-as-usual Haymitch. Did that mean that she had broken down in the train and revealed herself to be just like the others? The young mentor sighed, disinterested once more. Whatever is was, it wasn't his problem. He left: it was time for him to go find his own tributes before coming back to the mentor viewing lodge to watch the parade. He would go to District 4's allocated one this time.

* * *

Finnick sat down on the chair in front of a middle-size screen. He was back into the common lodge in the end. He had a feeling it would be interesting to hear the others' comments. So he watched and he listened.

He watched the screen where children displayed the colours of the districts they would never go back to. As usual the Careers looked confident, his own tributes included. Most of the others were younger and less imposing… Preys. The male tribute from 11 almost looked like a Career, dwarfing his petite female counterpart.

Finnick watched as the tributes from 12 appeared on the television screen. He listened as the Capitol went crazy about her and her flames. He watched as the innocent girl from the reaping was consumed by a more mature and impressive version of herself. He listened as the Capitol gave her a name, branding her into their minds: the Girl on Fire.

And Finnick snickered: maybe this year's Games would be interesting in the end, if only because someone from a lesser district was memorable, for once.

* * *

Finnick didn't talk to or help his tributes. That was the role of Jason and Milia, the other mentors. Each year when Finnick came back to the Capitol he was tasked with the _public_ aspect of mentoring and had to _meet_ a lot of people. So Finnick only watched what everyone else was watching on the television instead of the more detailed and informative mentors' channels.

He was at a _meeting_ when the scores were announced. Fortunately the man he was with desired to watch the announcement. So Finnick watched, as surprised as the rest of the Capitol, as the girl from 12 received an eleven, beating even the Careers.

Finnick smirked: yep, this year's Games would be interesting. So he decided to watch them more closely than usual, if only to see if her flames would burn bright or be extinguished.

* * *

So just like he had decided Finnick watched. He watched as the Girl on Fire survived the bloodbath at the very beginning of the Games while at the same time gaining a knife. As he watched her trek into the forest for several hours and then stop to take stock of her new belongings he discovered that she had a good head on her shoulders. He did not really pay attention to his tributes. After ten years he had realized that it was best that way. He paid attention to everyone equally, except for the Girl on Fire.

He watched and he discovered that she was a hunter. The fisher in him would have liked to take a closer look at her snares, to see how they worked. He watched as she climbed up in a tree and tied herself down in order to sleep. Smart move. He watched as she observed the Career pack kill another tribute nearby.

He didn't watch what happened during the first night. He had an appointment. But when he entered the common viewing room in the morning and watched District 12's screen he saw that she had grown more dehydrated. He watched as Haymitch and her seemed to have a conversation through the screen. Smart girl.

A lull in the Games, at least regarding the girl. Another appointment. Than another. Finnick wished he could watch the Games in the mentor room instead. Anything but the appointments. The only bright side was that everyone in the Capitol watched the Games, which meant that even during his appointments he could still watch them, or at least the edited version. He was at an appointment when he watched her run for her life and trying to escape a fire that Finnick knew had been meant for her. He watched as she ran and ran and twisted and turned. He watched as she screamed when her thigh burned. The Girl on Fire burned. And she kept running.

Finnick watched as she hissed in pain when she climbed up a tree despite her injuries, once again running for her life as the Career pack chased her. He noted that his tributes were not part of it. But the male tribute from her district was. He watched as she taunted them. He repressed a laugh. The night was fast approaching as she waited in the tree, high enough to be safe.

When the silver parachute arrived in a higher branch next to her, he almost winced with her, imagining the pain she was in. He'd never been burned but it looked nasty. When she sighed in relief after applying the medicine, he decided to call it a night. He had no appointment.

He had to admit: he was intrigued. It wasn't every year that someone from the double-digit districts survived that long, especially when the Career pack was hunting them.

Later he watched the sky in the arena beginning to light up. The night-and-day rhythm was different in the arena: the Gamemakers made it so the hours when most activity took place in the arena were when most of the Capitolites were up and watching. After 74 years of Games, they knew the crack of dawn was one of the most interesting parts of the day: the tributes were tired or sleeping, their guard lowered.

Finnick watched the girl in the tree in the still dark light of the very early morning. She was climbing up again. Where to?

"-Tracker jackers." Came the voice of the mentor of District 7.

"-Hum?

-12. She's climbing up to a nest of tracker jackers. The girl from 11 showed it to her.

-Where is she now?

-Disappeared in the trees again."

What could the girl possibly do with tracker jackers?

Finnick watched as she started sawing the branch the nest was in. His eyes widened slightly in surprise and disbelief. Was she going to do what he thought she was going to do? He watched the nest fall down on the ground and the tracker jackers explode out of it, attacking the Career pack. She had done exactly what he thought she would do. He had a short laugh and turned around when he heard Haymitch's guffaw. Her mentor had just arrived in the room.

"-Ahah, Sweetheart, you're priceless!" He laughed some more.

"-I got to say, Abernathy, your Girl on Fire has balls of steel.

-That she has, Pretty Boy, that she has."

Finnick watched her, now more intrigued than ever. He watched as the little girl from 11 helped her through the hallucinations during his appointments. He watched as the Girl on Fire fed her and treated her like a friend.

He was at yet another appointment when he watched her blow up the Careers' supplies sky high. He bit his cheek to prevent himself from smiling. She was on fire all right, that girl. And at that moment Finnick knew. He knew that he would watch her go back home. Because she was a fighter. She packed more will to survive in her petite form than the huge male tribute from 2.

He was back alone in his room a few hours later when he watched her break down. The little girl from 11 was now home. He watched as the girl from 12 tucked her in her bed of flowers and cried for her. He watched when she brought her fingers to her mouth and suffered with District 11. On the mentor channel he watched as she cried when she received the small bread a whole district had paid a fortune to send her. He knew this was not showed on the television. But he watched. And he saw something. He saw that maybe the Girl on Fire had done something. Something that was branded into the districts' minds.

* * *

Finnick kept watching. And as he watched, he saw others start to really watch too. The Capitol was watching. The rules changed. And Panem watched her look for the boy and bring him back to health. Haymitch, that crafty man. Finnick watched as she drugged the boy. He watched as she kissed him. And because he was who he was, he knew without a doubt that not only would he watch her go home but he would also watch her give the world hell. For the girl from 11. For forcing her, the free spirited girl of 12, to play a game she had played by her own rules until now. Because of who he was, he knew that she had been forced to embrace the rules and give the Capitol a show. Because of who he was Finnick saw through the kisses. After all, he was Finnick Odair.

And so others, along with Finnick, watched the boy from 11 spare her just because. Because of what she had done.

And Panem watched as she and the two boys left in the arena ran for their lives. In the eyes of Panem and above all of the Capitol, the mutts were big terrifying dogs. But not for the mentors. Not for the Victors, who watched and saw the horror on the girl's face. They knew that whatever was too small to be clearly seen on the screen was something she would always see in her dreams. For they knew how the arena worked.

Panem watched as the girl and the boy were finally the only ones left. Bloody, scared, exhausted, but happy, in a way that only Victors could understand. But the Games did not end. And Panem watched as the rules changed again. Finnick watched as she almost became a Victor. He watched as she made up her mind and once again did something. He watched as a girl from District 12 of all places, embraced the rule of the arena, the rule of the show in the purest form, and made it hers. She had been forced to give Panem a show. Finnick watched as she embraced the show and, with a handful of berries, bent the rule of the Games. Finnick and the mentors and the Victors and the Districts and the Capitol watched as the girl from 12 went back home hand in hand with the boy.

And Finnick let himself smile. This year's Games had been more than interesting. He had watched a girl become a Victor. But by her own rules. He had watched her become something. Something he did not know the nature of yet but something he would keep watching. And Finnick couldn't wait to watch her again. And to meet her, that girl from District 12, that hunter, that survivor, that Victor, that Girl on Fire. That girl who had branded her name on his mind. Katniss Everdeen.


	3. Chapter 3 - Mrs Everdeen

_Here it is, a new but short chapter._

 _I don't know when I'll post the next one. Probably quite soon (writing this stuff helps me not setting my study books on fire so I try to write a little bit every day)._

 _As the "story" develops you'll notice that I take some liberties with the story line. In other words, this fic is not going to follow the cannon all the way. I'll remain as close as possible but sometimes, for the ideas I wanted to explore (mostly the characters' depth) to work I needed to put them in situations that are not necessarily in the books (mostly because it's Katniss' POV all the way and my goal is precisely to have other POVs). This chapter doesn't really deviate (if at all). Chapters coming later will but I'll put an AN with my reasons when I post them._

 _Thank you for the reviews and "follow"s !_

 _Enjoy !_

 _Until next time! ;)_

 _\- xx_

 _[Chapter update: nothing new, just re-cutting the paragraphs into more reader-friendly, smaller pieces)_

* * *

 **They Watched**

 **Mrs Everdeen**

Lylia Everdeen watched as her youngest daughter played with her cat. She took a deep breath. Oh how she was tempted to just forget. To close her eyes and never open them again. Or to keep them open but just cease to see. How long had she been wishing for time to just stop? Or if she had any say about the speed of time at all, how she wished it would speed back in time. To a time when she was happy. When she fell asleep every night in the strong arms of her wonderful husband. How she wished she could still spend hours listening to him as he sung the birds into silence.

A burst of laughter snapped her back into her kitchen. Her jaw tensed. She had almost let herself slip back again. Primrose looked at her, a smile on her lips and in her eyes as her hands twisted the length of rope Buttercup was trying to chase down.

Her daughter.

Her wonderful, beautiful daughter.

Lylia couldn't believe that she had almost let her die in her weakness. Yet, she knew it would be so easy to fall back into it. She had never known she was so weak before the mine destroyed her life. And now one of her daughters was fighting death once more. Only this time, when she was willing to do anything to help, she couldn't. She couldn't do anything.

Her little girl would be fighting to survive, to not be killed, because she did the one thing Lylia couldn't do (not only by law but also because she wouldn't have been able to): she stepped up. Her daughter, her wonderful, strong daughter had chosen to risk her own death (or life, depending on how one viewed life) in order to save her little duck.

Did she even have the right to call Katniss her daughter still? She hadn't been a mother to her in so long.

Oh how Lylia wished she could be like her. Like her strong Katniss, who resembled her father so much it hurt, who had ordered her to be a mother to Prim because she couldn't be here anymore.

Lylia clenched her jaws even tighter. She would do this. She would be Prim's mother once more. She would not betray her daughters this time.

But oh, how painful it was. How hard it was.

And Lylia had to remind herself every day that she had to do this. She didn't have a choice. And so, like every day since Katniss had saved her sister Lylia forced herself back into her own life. She knew she would be tempted to slip back into nothingness again. But she would have to resist.

And resist she did, for today was the day they had to watch Katniss enter the arena for the first time.

And so she watched. She did nothing but watch. She _could_ do nothing but watch.

It was a miracle that she had not shed a single tear yet. She knew she couldn't. For Prim.

For Prim, who was forced to watch her sister whimper in agony when flames tore her flesh, who was forced to watch as her sister cried for her own death in that arena as the big brown eyes of little Rue dimmed and lost their light. Lylia _could not_ cry.

Prim didn't cry.

So Lylia watched, eyes dry but hands clenched so hard into her dress she almost tore the fabric. She watched everything happen in a blur.

She watched as Prim became her only daughter. Because she realized that the girl who left the arena with the boy and who would soon return to District 12 would not be her daughter. Not anymore. She would be a broken person. And Lylia almost cried at that. How cruel maybe to be thinking like that. But Lylia didn't think Katniss would not be her daughter anymore in a cruel way. She mourned the fact that her daughter had lost her innocence. Her very age.

Because whoever came out of the arena was not a 16 year old girl.

Lylia had witnessed it once. With Haymitch. She hadn't understood it at the time. What had changed. Now she did. Now she understood. Haymitch. Katniss. Both had lost their innocence and now evolved in a different world. A world where children were killed by children. Only, those children were not children anymore. They were killers.

And now Lylia was terrified. She was terrified that her daughter, her baby, her wonderful Katniss would become like Haymitch. Like poor Haymitch who wished for nothing more than to just forget.

But then Lylia hoped. She hoped that maybe Katniss would overcome all this and retain a bit of her innocence and purity. Because she wasn't alone. She had Peeta. Maybe it would be enough. And for once Lylia didn't let herself be pulled into nothingness. Instead she let herself be pulled (and maybe pushed herself a bit too) into this hope. She let it took hold of her entire being.

Yes.

Her daughter would be alright. She wasn't alone. She had Peeta. There was nothing to fear.

(Lylia Everdeen let herself sink into weakness once more when she refused to acknowledge that deep down she knew, oh she knew that her strong daughter had been broken in a way that even the Mellark boy would never be able to fix.)


	4. Chapter 4 - Gale

_Hello !_

 _So, this chapter is longer and slightly divergent from cannon. This was actually my original idea so that's why it's a bit more developed than the others (although Finnick's is long too... maybe longer actually). When I read the book I had a lot of images coming to mind about Gale and his reaction to the whole thing. Unfortunately, the situations that popped into my mind didn't exist in the book so I had to made them up (and maybe they're possible because the book is Katniss' POV so who knows what she doesn't know?). So here is my interpretation of Gale's view on some parts of the story._

 _Enjoy !_

 _'Till next time ;)_

 _xx_

 _[ **Chapter update** : there is nothing new, just correcting a few typos and re-cutting paragraphs on Nikkette's suggestion - thanks for tip ;) )_

* * *

 **They Watched**

 **Gale**

Gale remembers. How could he forget? How could he forget that day? That day he watched the woman he loved volunteer to save her sister.

How could she not? Gale knew her. He knew that Katniss would do anything for Prim. When her voice rang out in the square he had had half a mind to volunteer too. So he could be with her. So he could protect her. So he could make sure she would come back to the flower who loved her goat and cat.

But Gale knew Katniss. He knew that she would never forgive him if he volunteered. She would never forgive him for risking his own life. For abandoning his family. And for abandoning hers. It was an unspoken agreement between the two of them. No. It was more than an agreement. It was a vow. A promise. Should anything happen to one of them, the other would take care of her or his family.

Thus, Gale had to watch as she saved her sister, condemning herself to a deadly game and condemning him to watch her fight for her life.

He knew she could do it. He remembers telling her that in the small room in the Justice building before she was forced onto the train that would take her away. He knew she could survive this. But it tore him apart to know she would suffer while doing it. Katniss, despite her roughness and borderline pessimistic realism, was someone pure. Someone who loved deeply and suffered greatly from the life the world was forced to live. No, not the whole world. But that was another debate he would not have now. He watched as Katniss, his strong and beautiful Catnip, the woman he loved so deeply disappeared in a train she might not come back out from.

Weeks later he watched her get out of the train. How proud he was. And relieved. Not happy. The dimness in her eyes and the boy's hand in hers prevented him from being truly happy. Of course he was happy that she survived. But he had this feeling that it was not over.

He admits that he was also relieved and happy when the weeks passed and she kept away from the other boy. He was happy that they could just be the two of them in the woods when he was not deep inside the earth, digging in the tunnels that killed both their fathers.

But he remembers other things too.

He remembers that one morning, before the sun even came up, he softly knocked on the door of her new house, his sick brother in his arms. Mrs Everdeen had opened and motioned them inside. Gale would never forget. He _could_ never forget the blood-curdling scream that suddenly resonated in the house as Mrs Everdeen examined Vick. He would never forget how Mrs Everdeen had run upstairs, himself following her, to find the door to a bedroom open, Primrose in her nightgown trying to wake a screaming Katniss up. He would never forget the feral yet terrified look in her eyes when she snapped to awakeness, still screaming. He remembers how her scream just stopped and how she had called for Prim in a panic, her voice rough and broken. He remembers how once her eyes had found her sister she had clung onto her like life itself, like she was drowning, not even noticing the tears that were streaming down her face.

Gale remembers thinking, in that moment, that perhaps he had lied to her all those weeks ago when he had told her that hunting animals and humans were the same things, that she would be fine.

As he watched his Catnip struggle to breathe he realized that maybe she wasn't all right. Far from it.

After that day he had paid more attention to her, to the shadows in her eyes, to the shape of her lips. And he saw that she wasn't fine. She wasn't all right. She was getting better. But Gale wondered if she was really getting better or just better at pretending that she was.

He watched her, over her. He passed by the Victor's Village everyday after work.

She never noticed.

He would watch her on the couch from the shadows of the kitchen, where Mrs Everdeen asked him again and again to make himself known to her. Everyday Lylia would open her door to the quiet rasping of his knuckles on it, always when Katniss was in another room. He knew that she wouldn't want his worry, mistaking it for pity. So he stayed hidden. He watched as her face grew more elongated, the shadow under her eyes deeper, darker.

He watched as she moved around in another world. A world that was juxtaposed to the one he and everyone else lived in. Even the baker boy.

He watched as she crossed the street to her mentor's house and came back with a waver in her step but her whole frame less tense. Gale realized that she wasn't alone in her world, even if she didn't realize it herself. Or maybe she did. Gale realized that in that world, in the other world also lived Haymitch Abernathy.

Later, when he watched her on the television, reading speeches about dead people, he realized that this other world was the world of the Victors. He wasn't quite sure what that meant yet. Maybe he would find out some day.

When she came back from her Victory Tour, Gale wasn't jealous anymore. Not about the announced wedding. Because he had watched her and he knew this wedding hurt her as much as it could have hurt him had he let himself believe the story. Even more so.

By the look in Prim's eyes he knew that his Catnip had started screaming again. She sank deeper into her parallel world.

He watched her when they hunted. She had always been silent and observant in the woods. But now she was on her guard, the string of her bow ready to snap.

One Sunday he had been later than usual: his mother had asked him to help moving a heavy piece of furniture. He had followed her tracks (just his usual line of snares she had taken upon herself to relieve of their prey). He had arrived behind her silently.

He remembers her eyes.

How for one fraction of a second they had made him feel like he was in front of a predator. She was back in the arena. He remembers how a fraction of a second later her eyes had widened when she recognized him just as she released her arrow. That fraction of a second had been enough for her to alter her aim. He remembers the noise the arrow had made as it flew right next to his ear, grating him slightly and drawing one drop of blood. He remembers how she had yelled at him in a strange mixture of anger, panic and self-loathing. She had hit him (not even enough to hurt him). He had called out his nickname for her several times before she calmed down enough to really notice that he was all right. She had snapped her mouth shut, gone to retrieve her arrow, turned around and left. He did not follow her. He knew she didn't want him to. So he had picked up where she had left and inspected all of their snares. He didn't shoot anything that day. She had screamed loud enough for any wild life to hide for a few hours.

At the end of the afternoon when he went to her house to give her her catch she wasn't there. Lylia took the rabbits and indicated that she was at Haymitch's. When he knocked, the Victor opened his door and motioned him inside. He followed the staggering man to his living room and found Katniss passed out on the couch, an empty bottle of Ripper's rotgut in her hand. His heart had broken a bit at the sight. And hate filled him. Hate for the Capitol who made her like this. He swore to himself that he would make them pay for it. For breaking the wonderfully strong woman she had been.

He had taken her into his arms and brought her back home. Lylia's eyes were sad as she opened the door. He promised that he would pass by in the morning to check on her (he would make sure Jared covered for him at the mine for a few hours, consequences be damned). When he came back in the morning it was Katniss who opened the door. She frowned and glared and turned around without a word. When he entered the kitchen she was chopping carrots with a sharp knife, her back turned to him and the rest of the house. She ignored his attempts at conversation. He had sighed and sat down. He remained silent, knowing that she would eventually talk to him.

He saw Prim walk to the kitchen in her school clothes. She was holding a metal basin. When she entered the kitchen the basin slipped from her hands and crashed loudly on the floor.

Gale watched as it happened almost in slow motion. He watched the basin bang and bounce loudly on the floor, Prim jumping in surprise. He remembers the _thwack_ the sharp knife Katniss had been holding made as it embedded itself in the wall behind Prim. He remembers turning around and seeing Katniss, another knife in hand, poised ready to spring, muscles tense, eyes hard, jaw set, nostrils flaring.

He remembers this eternal second it took for everyone to understand what had just happened. He then watched as Katniss crushed Prim in her arms, crying as she apologized again and again and asked her again and again if she was alright.

In that moment Gale understood. He understood so many things that he wasn't even sure it all happened in a single moment.

He understood that the other world where Haymitch and Katniss lived was a terrible world. But it was not a world parallel to the normal world. It was worst. It was a world of the past. It was the arena.

Gale understood in that moment that his Catnip didn't sometimes go back to the arena when she was in the woods. No. She had never left. He understood that when she seemed in the other world, her eyes distant, it was because she could not get herself to believe she was in the real world again, out of the arena.

He understood that she would need a very long time to recover from all this, if ever. He understood that as strong as Katniss was, there were just some things that wouldn't leave.

Plenty of other things passed by his mind in that moment but he did not understand all of them.

The moment ended and in the next a smoldering hatred swept everything inside of him. He would forever _loathe_ the Capitol for this. For making a loving and protective sister throw a knife at a girl for having dropped a basin.

And in that moment he hated Peeta for not being broken like Katniss, or better yet, _instead_ of her. He hated the other Victors who were not broken like hers, like that Finnick Odair, who had been in an interview on the television a few days ago, smiling and joking and being happy. Like all those Victors from 1 and 2 who spent their whole life basking in the attention.

And in that moment he hated Haymitch Abernathy a little less. He understood a little better why the Victor was always drunk, if this was the world some of the Victors lived in.


	5. Chapter 5 - Hazelle

_Helloo!_

 _So here's the new chapter!_

 _It's a shorter one. And it's slightly diverging from the original plot. At first I wanted to write the whole story (or all the chapters, whichever way you prefer) as POV of different people as they watched Katniss. However, once I started writing, there were just so many ideas that came to my mind and that weren't directly about Katniss that I couldn't just pass the oportunity to write them. And so, behold, here is the result!_

 _Some of the other chapters will also follow this tendency (this 3rd person watching the 2nd person watching Katniss)._

 _Also important, and I already mentioned it before, is the fact that I will diverge from cannon (it'll be more obvious in the next one)._

 _And last but not least, thank you for all the positive feedback (reviews, follows and favorites)! (Special thanks to **Nikkette** , who is the one responsible for making the paragraphs more reader-friendly ;) ) (BTW, you should totally check out her stories, they're great! I haven't read them all but the ones I did read were really good.)_

 _'Till next time ;)_

 _xx_

* * *

 **They Watched**

 **Hazelle**

Hazelle Hawthorne was a busy woman. What with four children to take care of. Especially since her husband died in the mine. Fortunately her eldest was now old enough to take care of the family and of himself. Well, for the most part. As strong as he was, both in body and mind, and despite the fact that he had been the one taking care of and providing for them, Hazelle knew that he was still just a boy. She saw it in the way he would play with his brothers and his sister. She saw it the way he would always ask for her opinion on something. Most of all she saw it as he struggled to understand his feelings for the girl he met in the forest.

Little Katniss. Oh she wasn't so little anymore but Hazelle had known her since she was a child. She had never really spoken to her before but the Seam wasn't that big. And her husband and the girl's father were both miners and friends. However, she wouldn't have thought that her big boy would end up falling in love with her. Hazelle saw her grow into a strong and fierce young woman. She knew Gale would succumb to her months if not years before he did, or at least before he realized he had. Hazelle loved the child. She was such a sweet person when you got to know her. She was always caring for the children, always giving them the fruits she found in the forest, dividing them equally between Prim and the younger Hawthornes. Hazelle watched fondly as her boy became entranced by the younger girl. Hazelle was happy. She would be a fine woman to spend his life with.

On the day of the Reaping, while relieved that her family was safe one more year, she couldn't help but hurt for the two remaining Everdeens. She also hurt deeply for her boy, who had left just after the train to go into the forest. When he came back it was already nighttime. His jaw was clenched. His eyes glaring at everything. But Hazelle knew. As a mother she knew that her baby boy was hurting. That he was scared despite all his bravado. And who wouldn't be? The one he loved had been taken away to fight over two dozen people to the death.

Hazelle watched the Games. She watched them every year, like everyone else. They didn't have much of a choice. But this year she _really_ watched them. She watched as her son cringed and swore and clenched his fists in fear and anger. She watched as the strong but sweet Katniss was killed. Oh not physically. But Hazelle wasn't blind. She had watched almost forty years of Hunger Games. She had known Haymitch Abernathy before the second Quarter Quell. She knew how destructive the Games were – and she wasn't even thinking about those who never came back from them.

Weeks passed and turned into months. She watched as Gale slowly came to realize that his Catnip might not have come back from the Games. She was now Katniss Everdeen, Victor of the 74th Hunger Games. She watched as this fueled Gale's anger at the Capitol. She agreed wholeheartedly with him on the principles but she dearly hoped that he would not do anything foolish. Especially now that new Peacekeepers were here. Of course that had been wishful thinking. In a sense she was proud of her boy for being so loyal to his beliefs but she was a mother and could not help but be terrified he would one day go too far.

When she started working at Haymitch's place she didn't know how to feel. She did not know Haymitch anymore. Only as the drunk he was. But as she spent more time cleaning his house she started to view him differently. Without a doubt his screams and muffled sobs when he didn't realize she was there helped this new understanding along a lot. Hazelle knew he was a broken man but never before had she truly understood the extent of the damage.

One day Katniss came in. It wasn't the first time but this time she asked for a drink. Hazelle was working in silence in the kitchen, none of the Victors realized she was there. Her first reaction was to stand up and go and scold Katniss but something in her voice had kept her away. This had not been the voice of a 16 year old girl. It was as broken as too many people's in the Seam. Too old. Too aware of the cruelties of the world. Haymitch had chuckled, "Be my guest, Sweetheart" he had said. They had drunk in silence for a few minutes. When they started talking Hazelle listened but remained seated in her kitchen chair. It wasn't in her nature to pry but Katniss was someone she had come to care deeply for and she was worried. She couldn't hear everything that they had said but she understood the main ideas. They were talking about the Games. Not the Games per say but their consequences. One of Haymitch's sentences had been slightly louder than the rest: "there are no victors, Sweetheart, only survivors". His voice was dry but soft at the same time, resigned. Hazelle had the feeling this was not the first time he said it. After seeing Haymitch every day she now believed him.

Her heart lurched for Katniss. For her family who would never truly get her back. For her son, who would have to watch her wither away. And most of all, for Katniss herself. Hazelle, after the third time she found the two of them drinking, knew without a doubt that Haymitch and Katniss where very much alike. She would wither away and would never recover from her Games. Hazelle didn't think that she'd become an alcoholic, but she was undoubtedly broken way beyond repair.

Because she spent so much time at Haymitch's Hazelle knew fairly quickly what her son took months to figure out: a Victor never leaves the arena. She could see it in the way Haymitch always checked every exit in a room when he entered it, no matter his apparent level of intoxication. She could see it on the way he jumped when something slipped her hand and banged on the floor (after one week she made sure never to drop anything again). She saw it in the way he always managed to have something sharp within reach. She saw it in the way Katniss walked. In the way she was always aware of her surroundings (it must be exhausting to live like that). She saw it in the small scratch on his ear Gale came home with one Sunday (oh she didn't resent Katniss for that – she actually thought Gale had taken a risk by approaching her silently). She saw it in the way Katniss would wake up Haymitch most of the time (always planning an escape route before anything and always mindful of the knife that would always slash the air, sometimes even knocking it off the hand holding it). This routine was very telling in itself. Hazelle had half a mind to have Gale watch it so that he could understand better. Katniss had become a fighter.

The poor kid had been in survival mode since her father died. The Games had only just sent her deeper and now she was struggling to come back.

The day they announced the Quarter Quell Hazelle watched Gale explode. She had closed her eyes for a few seconds, hurting for Katniss. Gale had cried that evening. Hazelle had held him as the tears ran down his face. Gale wasn't stupid. He knew that she would not get out of the arena this time. As she held her eldest son while he mourned for the one he loved Hazelle let a few tears of her own slip on her cheeks. She could not imagine the horror the Victors must be feeling right now. Not only Katniss and Haymitch and Peeta, but all of them. They were supposed to be safe and be left in peace (little did she know that one Johanna Mason would spit these exact same words to Caesar Flickerman a few months later).

Hazelle Hawthorne was a busy woman but she saw a lot. She could speak for hours about the things she saw, about Gale, about Katniss, about Haymitch. But all the things she had seen would not prepare her for what was coming: once more she would have to watch her son watch his Catnip fight. Once more she would have to watch this butchery. Only this time Hazelle would have to watch as a 17 year old girl entered an arena full of experienced and angry killers. This time, Katniss Everdeen would not come back.

* * *

 _A/N: small reward for bearing with my long A/N : **sneak peak** : the next chapter will be ... _

_*suspense*_

 _Prim's POV!_


	6. Chapter 6 - Prim

_Hello, good people!_

 _Here is the new chapter._

 _The update was really quick because it was already written. Actually this is one of the first chapters I wrote. I just don't post them in the order I write them but in chronological order regarding the book._

 _This chapter will be slightly divergent from canon because that's how I pictured Prim could act while reading the book. You'll notice that the divergence is really minor in itself but for me this is a huge part in the personal development of the character of Prim, one that maybe Katniss didn't notice because she was so focused on what was happening to her (not that I can blame her)._

 _As the story develops, the coming chapters will get more complex, longer and darker because, well, the canon becomes more complex and darker._

 _Thanks to all of you readers and followers and reviewers, etc.! And especially to **SibunaMockigjay** , who reviewed all the chapters and whom I couldn't answer to and thank by PM!_

 _Enjoy the ride!_

 _xx_

* * *

 **They Watched**

 **Prim**

Primrose Everdeen was so relieved, so happy to have her sister back. She had been terrified when her name got called on Reaping Day and even more so when her sister volunteered. She didn't know how many times she had cried in the following weeks, sitting on her bed in her room when her mother was downstairs. It was all her fault. Her sister was risking her life because of her. These dark thoughts and the terror finally disappeared when Katniss came back.

The following months were a blur. Katniss had been traumatized by her experience in the arena.

Prim grew up. She grew up fast. She came to understand a lot about life in these few months. She came to understand that her sister would never be the same again. But that was okay. It was okay because she screamed less and less and smiled more and more every day. She would never be back to her pre-arena self but Prim didn't mind. Her sister was getting better and slowly healing. That was all that mattered. Prim knew of course that Katniss was far from healed. She knew she still went to Haymitch's and came back smelling of alcohol. But Prim didn't mind. She knew her sister. She knew that she would get there, eventually.

Prim knew that they both had aged beyond their years through this whole fiasco.

Prim grew worried when she remembered that the next Games would soon be coming up. She was worried about herself (her name would still be in the pool) but she mostly worried about Katniss. She would have to be a mentor, now. Prim didn't think that Katniss really realized that yet. But she did. She was worried because she knew her sister would break when she would lose child after child to the arena. She knew that because she knew her sister and she had observed Haymitch.

Even knowing that, nothing could have prepared her for the horror that was to come.

Prim would remember that day until she died. She was giddy with the prospect of knowing which of Katniss' wedding dresses had been chosen. She knew that Katniss wasn't happy about this but Prim was still a little girl at heart and those dresses made her sister look like a princess from the stories of old Gale would sometimes tell her and Posy. They all sat on the couch in the sitting room, their mother looking reserved, Katniss glaring and herself repressing the smile that threatened to break out.

Prim would always remember that day.

One moment Katniss was groaning about the chosen dress, Prim giggling, and the next the front door slammed as Katniss fled followed by their mother's screams.

Prim's mind had gone blank for a few seconds. Then everything came crashing down on her: Katniss was going back into the arena.

Fear, sadness, injustice, it all suffocated her. Or maybe it was the fact that she had stopped breathing. Prim had suddenly felt ice cold. She did not cry herself to sleep that night. She was past the point of crying.

When her sister came back home from Haymitch's her eyes were empty. She staggered to her room and passed out, one tear falling down from each closed eye, sliding slowly down her cheeks.

That night Prim could hear Haymitch's screams from the other side of the street. She could hear the sound of things trashing and crashing against the walls.

She couldn't hear anything coming from Peeta's house. Could not even see the smoke of a fire from the chimney. She knew he was home. She could see him through her window. He spent the whole night sitting on a chair, not moving a single muscle, eyes fixed on something far away, out of anybody else's reach.

That night Prim swore to herself she would never cry again. She would have to be strong for her sister because this time Katniss wouldn't be strong enough on her own.

Something changed in the following weeks. Peeta forced Haymitch and Katniss to act like Careers. At first Prim didn't really understand why. She agreed that it might be a good idea but she didn't understand why they were so focused on it. When she asked her mother she didn't get an answer.

Surprisingly the answer came from Greasy Sae.

Prim never went to the Hob but Greasy Sae one day came to the Victor's Village with her granddaughter. She had tripped and badly scrapped her leg. Prim had been watching the trio of Victors going through a hard session of exercises to strengthen their bodies. Greasy Sae had come next to her and watched them too. She had hummed in approval. Prim had asked her why she approved. Greasy Sae had looked at her for a few seconds before giving her answer.

"-Your sister is going to need it," she had said, "she's not going to fight children who don't know what they're doing this time. She's gonna have to fight other Victors. People who have won their games, who have killed, who have mentored other tributes. These people will know what they're doing, little one. They will all be Careers. Your sister will be the child this time. Mark my words, these Games will be like nothing we've ever seen before. The Victors, they know how the arena works. And they've probably built a life out there since their victory, they will have something to go back to. There will be no hesitation to kill. Never forget that, little one."

Greasy Sae had paused for a moment, searching for something in Prim's eyes and apparently finding it.

"I think you know what I'm talking about: a Victor remains a Victor. They might have left the arena, but if young Haymitch is anything to go by, they never stop fighting. Your sister and her friends are smart to train. They will need it. They will need any help they can get." Greasy Sae had turned around then and gone back into the kitchen.

Prim stayed outside, watching Katniss, Haymitch and Peeta in a new light. She didn't know Greasy Sae knew so much. But now she understood. She realized that indeed, her sister was not the strong hunter anymore this time. Now she was just a girl who had been thrown into a world of violence. She will have to fight people whom Prim had never thought of in that way before. Victors.

These Games would be terrifying.

Prim renewed her vow to be strong for Katniss.

So for the following weeks, Prim helped them. She helped them by devising a special diet with her mother for them. She convinced Hazelle to start dropping things in Haymitch's house again, each time eliciting a faster and more controlled reaction (even more so when Haymitch understood what she was doing and fully embraced this new form of training). She convinced Gale to teach them how to make better snares. She taught them how to clean a wound, how to stitch (Katniss had been more than queasy about it), how to apply a bandage. Prim watched as they trained to run faster, to fight with their hands and to climb walls and the rare dying trees in the village.

It was heartbreaking to watch her sister train to become a better killer and to escape experience ones.

She watched as a hard glint entered her sister's eyes and never left.

She watched as that glint entered Peeta's and Haymitch's eyes as well.

They had all slipped into a mindset Prim hoped never to understand. A mindset Prim saw that Gale didn't understand but broke his heart.

Prim's heart broke too when she realized that at least one of them would never come back.

Reaping Day came (oh so quickly) and the silence was deafening. Parents were relieved that their children were safe for this year but didn't cheer. Never. Never would they cheer any aspect of those Games.

Prim watched as people kissed their fingers and put them in the sky, saying goodbye to Katniss Everdeen and Peeta Mellark one more time.

One last time.

Two weeks later Prim watched the television screen.

When the gong resonated, marking the beginning of the 75th Hunger Games, she saw that Greasy Sae had been right. There was no panic-fueled dash to the Cornucopia (or away from it), no waste of movement.

Instead there were 24 people applying a strategy of survival.

What shocked Prim the most was the lack of screams. Usually the bloodbath happened in the screams of those who try to escape the Careers, in the screams of those who broke down. Not this time. This time there was no panic. And no hesitation. Despite the speed of it all, it all appeared to Prim as a calm and methodic choreography. It was eerily and terrifying. It was deadly.

Greasy Sae had been right: these Games wouldn't be like anything Prim had ever seen.

* * *

 _BTW, if you'd like to see a particular person's POV, just say so. I'm not guaranteeing anything but one never knows, I might just get creative ;)_


	7. Chapter 7 - Darius

_New chapter !_

 _I want to thank you all for your reviews and suggestions of POV. I won't do all of them but some did give interesting ideas._

 _A lot of you asked for minor characters' POV. I was quite surprised actually but maybe I should have expected it with how you all seem to have liked Hazelle's chapter. So I took the decision to include more minor char's POV. And I will include them in between major characters._

 _This chapter was going to be Johanna's but I changed my mind. She'll come later. ;)_

 _This chapter is the longest, so far!_

 _Hope you enjoy!_

 _Till next time!_

 _xx_

 _[chapter update: just fixing typos, nothing new]_

* * *

 **They Watched**

 **Darius**

Darius remembers every day of his life. More precisely, his life was a repetition of identical days, making it very easy to remember.

Except for the first days of his life. This series of days had lasted until his sixth birthday. Although he didn't really remember anything from that period of his life, Darius is fairly certain that it was already a long succession of repetitions.

The second repetitive day of his life started on that sixth birthday. His parents, people he could barely remember, had taken him to the Capitol-appointed doctor of District 2. The doctor had examined him, like he did every child turning 6, and had declared him fit for the training. Darius was thus sent to the training center, never to see his family again. Had he been declared unfit, he would have been allowed to remain with his family a few more years before starting a mandatory apprenticeship to become a mason, integrating District 2's main industry.

Instead, Darius was sent to the training center. During the next four years his days had been filled with physical training and mental conditioning.

On his tenth birthday he was examined once more and tested on his capacities and skills, both mentally and physically. He had been deemed unfit for the Spear. He would become a Peacekeeper and be shipped to another district when he turned 18. Darius wasn't quite sure he liked the idea but at least he wouldn't be Reaped.

Officially, all the children between 12 and 18 in all the districts were eligible to be Reaped to become tributes for the Hunger Games. Unofficially, though, this was not the case in District 2. In District 2 strength and image were everything. The district couldn't afford to send weak tributes into the arena. The weakest children were destined to become masons. The best and strongest were sent to the Spear to be trained as Career tributes, under the cover of training to become Peacekeepers. Those who fell in between those ends of the specter were the ones who became Peacekeepers. Only those in the Spear were ever Reaped or designated as volunteers. Only the best, the strongest, the most skilled, the most ruthless were sent into the arena.

Darius wasn't part of the best. And he was not ruthless. In fact, Darius was soft and sweet – as much as someone from 2 raised to be a Peacekeeper could be. Darius had been deemed too soft for the Spear.

He didn't resent it.

Darius was someone who truly, deeply, sincerely loved life. Not his own life, but human life in general. He couldn't be happier about being a Peacekeeper: his job was literally to keep the peace and protect life!

He remembers being so impatient to turn 18 and discover the beauty of Panem.

When the day finally arrived he had excitedly extended his hand to take one of the twelve pieces of paper in the bowl in front of him. The number on it would be his first assignment. This number would determine his life for the next 5 years! He had hoped for a nice number "4", already able to hear the waves crashing on the beach, or even a "3", opening the doors to knowledge and innovation.

Darius hadn't expected the black ink to form a sad "12".

The officer behind the desk had congratulated him in a voice as flat as the train tracks that would lead him to the next day of his life. According to him Darius was lucky: with him the unit was complete and he would depart first thing the next day to join his new unit on the train and then take over from the unit that had been in charge of 12 for the last five years.

His training partners had made fun of him. He had been disappointed. Soon enough, though, his positive nature shone through again and he promised himself to give it his best. He was now a Peacekeeper, he would bring honor to the force and uphold its values!

He lost his illusions of greatness the very next day, both literally and figuratively. His commanding officer, Officer Cray, was a grumpy old man who resented being sent to District 12 after all his years of loyal services.

It didn't take long for Darius to realize that District 12 was a very far cry from the happy district his instructors had talked about. They had depicted a district where life was hard but the people were hard workers and happy to take over the huge responsibility of excavating the precious material that was coal.

They had at least been right about one thing: life in 12 was hard. Harder than anything Darius could have imagined.

At the beginning he had struggled to fit in: he was the youngest of the unit, the only new recruit. His head was still full of the ideals and rules that had been drilled into it for the last 8 years. There were so many infractions to the rules here in District 12 that he could hardly keep up! And Officer Cray didn't arrest half as many people as he should!

When his stomach started rumbling without interruption, eating at his lawful uprightness, he decided that maybe Greasy Sae was more of a cook than a criminal.

Every time he would come to the Hob for a bowl of grub he would observe the people surrounding him. He soon came to admire them. Life in 12 was hard. Even more so in the Seam. But these people were resilient. They fought every day of their life. They fought the earth deep in the tunnels. They fought for every piece of value. They fought for their life.

It didn't prevent children from dropping, their scrawny bodies nothing but bones.

It didn't prevent them from being blown up in those dark dark tunnels of theirs.

But Darius admired them all the same. There was a fire in their eyes. Not so much in the blue eyes of the merchants, but in the grey eyes of the Seam. Oh, the fire was dim, naught but a small and fragile wisp of flame. It was subdued, suffocated by fear, life, and the weight of the world.

Nevertheless, these people knew how to survive.

Some of them more than others.

Darius especially admired Greasy Sae, for her audacity to sell chicken soup filled with fish bones. And Ripper, for her unending supply of medicinal alcohol (Darius amusedly thought that it must be one of the most efficient medicines in Panem, for so few people seemed to stay hurt for long after buying her some). And Mrs Everdeen, for keeping Death away with her hands and her plants.

Most of all, Darius admired two people. A boy, barely more than a couple of years younger than himself, and a girl, maybe six years younger. They were both children of the Seam. Dark hair, grey eyes, almost scrawny but strong and proud, daring the world to bring them down.

The boy, Gale, always looked at Darius with a flicker of defiance in his Seam eyes.

The girl, however, managed to hide it better. Or rather, she didn't _look_ at him with defiance. Her defiance was both more discreet and more obvious at the same time. It was less acute, less intense, yet, radiating from her whole body. It was second nature to her.

Darius had heard the stories. About how Katniss Everdeen almost died of starvation, along with her baby sister and her mother after her father went up in smoke. How she had fought her way back to life and taken upon herself to care for her family when she was 12.

There was something about her that fascinated Darius. Her reaction every time he offered her a kiss for her merchandise was only a bonus. Darius didn't really think of her in a romantic way. He definitely wouldn't refuse a kiss from her but he teased her more for her reaction than for the kiss in itself.

He didn't know what exactly fascinated him so: her eyes, her youth, her maturity, her strength? He didn't know, but it drew him in like a moth to a flame. The fire in her eyes _did_ burn stronger than in other people's eyes.

Like every year, Reaping Day came. Darius remembers being part of the 4-men squad sent to fetch one Haymitch Abernathy, sole Victor of District 12 and drunk beyond coherence.

Darius didn't quite know what to think about Haymitch Abernathy. The man was a wreck and had been for as long as Darius remembers. He had known of the Victor from 12 for as long as he had watched the Games. Darius had always wondered what made him drink so much. Other Victors weren't like that. So what had happened? Darius knew that his Games had been special, a Quarter Quell. He didn't know what that had entailed but was this the reason for his addiction? Darius couldn't help but feel disdain for this man. Sure, he was a positive guy but even Darius couldn't fathom why someone would so easily throw away his life like that, and with it the life of every tribute that he had to mentor.

Darius didn't resent Haymitch for not bringing any Victor home with him after each Games. A tribute was a tribute, destined to be the districts' way of making amend for their rebellion almost 74 years ago. That was the price to pay for their treason.

Even though, it would have been nice to have some of the benefit brought on by a victory for one year.

Once the drunk had been seated on his designated chair, Darius went back to his post and observed the Reaping take place.

He was as surprised as the rest of the world when Katniss Everdeen volunteered.

He had sighed in his helmet: he would miss ruffling her feathers. She was a nice person, what a pity she would not come back.

She had.

And not alone.

Darius admired her all the more for what she had managed to do. He had known she was a fighter but he hadn't expected her to come back. She had proven him wrong. She had proven everybody wrong.

She was once more walking around in the Hob, as if she had never left.

But she had.

Darius could see the subtle differences. She now bought what she needed with money instead of buttons or old clothes. She wasn't so scrawny anymore. She was more confident.

She was also more guarded. She smiled less. She looked tired. She was jumpy.

She suddenly reminded him of Haymitch Abernathy.

What had happened?

Darius had watched the Games, like everybody else. But what he had seen didn't account for her change. Something had happened or was happening that didn't appear on the television screens. Something had changed her. He didn't know what.

Her strength still fascinated him.

* * *

From his twelfth birthday until his eighteenth, Darius had been taught the importance of hierarchy.

Hierarchy was the structure that made the world go round and that allowed life to exist. Without structure and discipline, the world would be thrown into chaos once more.

Darius had been taught to obey his superiors, always and forever. Failure to do so, he had been told, would have dire consequences.

Darius had been taught to respect authority.

It was difficult to respect Old Cray, who smirked every evening when he opened his door and chose which poor young girl he would _graciously_ save from starvation.

Commander Thread, however, was a man Darius could respect. The arrival of the new Head Peacekeeper had been brutal, to say the least, but Darius had realized that he was the one in the wrong, him and his unit, for having grown complacent and authorized crime to run rampant in District 12.

Despite how much Thread was right and crime _did_ run rampant in 12, now that the new commander was correcting that, Darius' stomach was once more empty.

And when he had seen the blood pouring from the mangled flesh that had been Gale Hawthorne's skin 19 whip lashes ago, Darius had been glad that his stomach had contained nothing he could vomit.

Darius had clenched his jaws at lash number 5. He had frowned at lash number 8. Surely, Gale had learned his lesson. His stomach had started squirming around lash number 15. At lash number 20, Darius' hand snapped to Commander Thread's wrist, maintaining it in the air, already moving onto lash 21.

Darius had been punched into unconsciousness before realizing what his body had done.

He had regained a semblance of consciousness around what his colleague informed him was lash number 38. His vision had been blurry, but not enough not to wince at the state of Hawthorne's back.

He remembers his eyes widening slightly when Katniss Everdeen threw herself between Thread and her friend. He remembers wincing as the clashing sound of the whip striking her face resonated in the silent square.

He had lost consciousness again right after that.

He had woken up in a white cell. He did not remember a lot of what had happened after. He remembers understanding that he was not in District 12 anymore. He remembers a man in white and large pincers. He remembers screaming as the pincer gripped his tongue. He remembers pain.

White, blinding pain.

Blood also.

The calm and detached voice of a Peacekeeper officer telling him that he had brought it on himself and that he would learn how to obey properly.

An Avox.

They had made him into an Avox.

They had pushed him into a new repetitive day of his life. A day filled with silence in his ears and cacophony in his head. A day with orders and commands and weird people and no way of screaming his rage and injustice.

Darius had been lost. So lost. How could he have been so wrong? He had been proud to be a part of Panem, to be a Peacekeeper, to protect life.

Darius had never set foot in the Capitol before. He did not understand what he was seeing. How could _this_ exist in the same world as the Seam? How could these people be so unburdened, so carefree, so wasteful of life and resources when children were dying of hunger in District 12? Had he been wrong to believe what his instructors had told him about the world? Never before Darius had doubted his beliefs. Never before had he felt so betrayed by the country he had sworn to protect and serve. This was no justice!

Never before had Darius been disgusted by people. The excitement of the Capitol at the announcement of the Quarter Quell broke something inside of him. It broke his faith in a world of justice and fairness.

There was some negative reactions about the Quell in the Capitol. People were sad to lose some of their favorite Victors, for surely, some of the good ones would be part of the competition! And just like that, the sadness was replaced with excitement.

Not in Darius. Darius remained sad as he understood that Katniss Everdeen would be a tribute again. It was a pity she would not get to live the life she had fought so hard to keep.

A new day of his life started the day after the Reaping. He was sent to the brand new training center, where he was to serve the tributes and mentors for this year's Games. He did not know which. He was assigned a "colleague", a red-haired Avox girl. She barely looked at him. She silently motioned for him to follow her to an elevator.

The elevator had no buttons in it. The Peacekeeper guarding it activated it with a key. They arrived in a small room with replacement Avox clothes and two basic beds. Darius understood that they were going to stay there for the duration of the Games, denied even the smallest attempt at privacy. A blue light lit up, indicating that the tributes' elevator was approaching. They both got out of the room and waited their arrival, as a good Avox should.

Darius remembers watching the doors of the elevator open to a sight he had not anticipated. Before his eyes stood District 12's very own team. He should have known.

He remembers seeing recognition pass through the eyes of Haymitch Abernathy, quickly hidden behind indifference.

He remembers seeing recognition, surprise and horror pass in the eyes of Katniss Everdeen before she managed to hide it, too.

This day of his life was going to be one of the longest, even if it would only last two weeks.

Darius remembers the strong grip Katniss had had on his fingers that day at supper when they both crouched down to pick up the pieces of the plate she had voluntarily shattered. He remembers feeling so many emotions pass through him and through his fingers during that brief moment.

Recognition, acknowledgement, regret, comfort, sadness, anger, injustice… Too many emotions to identify.

Darius had learned more about Katniss Everdeen in these two weeks than he had after years in District 12. He had also learned a whole lot more about Haymitch Abernathy. And the Capitol in general.

Peeta Mellark was very straightforward. Darius hadn't learned anything new about him.

About Haymitch Abernathy, Darius had learned that he also drank the finer stuff. And that he was angry. And resentful. And troubled. He learned that the man would do everything in his power to get at least one of them out of the arena. That he could coach and give advice. That he was far more complex than anybody had ever given him credit for.

Darius regrets having thought so badly of him before.

Katniss Everdeen was the one he learned most about.

He learned that she was even stronger and fiercer than he had thought. That she was angry, and determined. That she didn't trust easily. He also learned that she had nightmares. Horrible nightmares, if her screams in the night were anything to go by. He learned that she was terrified – but didn't know what about.

Darius also learned that Victors were different than what he had thought.

Peeta, Haymitch, Katniss… They were all haunted in their own way.

After a few days the female Avox started to write to him on a sheet of paper. Her name was Lavinia.

Thanks to her, he had learned that all the Victors were haunted. And angry.

Darius hadn't known what to think of all this.

The first day of the Games had arrived quickly.

He remembers the look on Katniss' face when they made eye contact for the last time. Once again there had been too many emotions in that contact to decipher. He was sure of one thing, though: it had been a goodbye.

Darius hadn't been authorized to watch the Games. He had been ordered to remain in District 12's floor and wait for orders.

They never came.

Instead, came four Peacekeepers and before he knew it, he was unconscious.

Darius remembers every day of his life. His life had been a long succession of days repeating themselves again and again. They were not worth remembering. So he decided to forget them.

Darius remembers every day of his life. Those days that had been worth remembering. Those days when he had crossed the path of Katniss Everdeen, a girl as bright as life itself.

Darius was someone who deeply loved life. Yet, as they cut off another part of his body and a scrambled cry tore out his sore throat, he couldn't help but wish he had died long ago.


	8. Chapter 8 - Johanna

_Here it is, a new chapter._

 _I try to update quite regularly._

 _I wrote this chapter a while back. Actually it was one of the first I wrote, directly after Finnick's._

 _You'll notice that the style has changed. For starters, there are small snippets of dialogue. I just felt that a more dynamic style would suit Johanna's character better. Also, be aware that this_ is _Johanna so there'll be swearing._

 _I still have a few little things to say but I'll write them at the end so there's no spoilers..._

 _Enjoy your read!_

 _[ **chap update** : just fixing typos and the layout but no change in the text]_

* * *

 **They Watched**

 **Johanna**

Johanna Mason didn't watch the Games. Well, sometimes she watched them but only if she had nothing better to do (and in her opinion even watching the trees grow rated as better than watching those fucking Games). She didn't even mentor. She had to, of course. But she didn't give a flying rat's ass about the Games or the tributes (they were fucked anyway, whether they died or won). There were enough Victors in Districts 7 that she didn't have to mentor every year (she didn't give a shit about the fact that some were clearly not in a state to mentor anyone: she didn't even mentor when it was her turn to, she sure as hell wouldn't start doing so when it wasn't).

She did go to the Capitol during the Games, though: the booze was free and why ruin a perfectly good opportunity to get the rage out of her system on those fucking perfect Capitol couches? (The fact that it happened often enough that she never reached the point of setting her district on fire was just a bonus). Plus some Victors were seriously fun to get plastered together with or to annoy out of their wits.

Thus Johanna Mason had made friends (or as close to friends as Johanna Mason let herself go) with several other Victors.

Weirdly enough (or at least it was weird for others), it was one Finnick Odair she was closest to. One would think that she would abhor him: after all, was he not the perfect Capitol-loving little Victor?

How wrong would it be to think that.

Johanna liked Finnick.

She liked him because he was like her and at the same time so different. She laughed every time she thought about it. Finnick was way more similar to her than people realized.

For starters he was ruthless – _come on_ the guy had won when he was 14, for hell's sake, how could people forget that? He was ruthless and vicious. Not vicious like Johanna, oh no. He was even better: he managed to make the Capitol forget that he was. He managed to make them let him deep in their midst, in their heart and in their life. In their secrets.

Finnick Odair was glorious.

He could break them so easily and they didn't even realize it. They kept asking for more and giving him more.

Fucking morons.

She also liked Finnick because he had remained human. He was whole. He wasn't perfect nor had he recovered perfectly from his Games (no Victor ever recovered) but unlike Johanna he hadn't given up on his humanity. She admired him for that. He still felt, he still lived. He still loved and suffered and hated and laughed and cried and so many more things. He was what Johanna could have been if she had been strong enough. He knew that. Yet, he didn't look down on her for it (quite the contrary) and she liked him for that.

Johanna knew that he also admired her. For having the strength to let go. To have done what he couldn't bring himself to do.

Funny.

Lastly, she also liked Finnick because he was just as broken as she was. She could see it in his eyes and in his smile (but only when he knew the world wouldn't be looking). She could hear it in his soft laugh when they were safe from the rest of Panem.

They had forged a special bond (they didn't know how to call it: "friendship" was so shallow compared to what they had and at the same time it implied so much more than what this was). Johanna couldn't have friends. She couldn't feel friendship. She couldn't feel anything anymore, only hatred and anger. But despite that she could be herself with Finnick. And he could be himself with her.

They had a profound understanding of one another.

She probably knew Finnick better than he knew himself and vice versa.

It was only normal for her when she saw through him while he didn't even realize there _was_ something to see through.

* * *

Johanna was surprised to see Finnick _watch_ the Games. So she started watching them too. To see what made him watch. She saw why he was so intrigued. The girl might have something interesting about her. But Johanna, because of who she was, couldn't bring herself to care. So she dismissed her and contented herself with simply watching Finnick (and drinking booze with Brutus).

When the Games ended Finnick was still intrigued.

Johanna wasn't.

But she knew he would keep an eye on the new Victor (what was her name again? And _no_ , Brutus, did she look like someone who cared about this year having two Victors? The boy was useless, it was insulting to call him a Victor).

Johanna decided to keep an eye on Finnick. She watched him because even _he_ didn't know if this was simple curiosity on his part or if it was something a bit more serious (and Johanna didn't know what to do with his uncertainty).

* * *

She paid a bit more attention to the Victory Tour than she normally would. She couldn't observe Finnick as they both were in their respective districts so she observed the girl. Johanna didn't see anything special about her. She even found her shallow and pathetic.

When the Tour arrived in District 7 Johanna decided to attend the party. Oh, not in the actual attendance but from the sidelines, where nobody paid attention to her (she would rather go back into the arena than actually attending any event hosted by the Capitol or for its glory). She observed the Victors. The boy was still completely useless (seriously, why had the girl even bothered keeping him alive?).

But the girl...

 _Damn._

That girl was as happy in love as Johanna herself was.

She snorted.

So that was what Finnick saw.

So much for the madly-in-love story.

When they left she called Finnick (she wasn't sure why the Capitol authorized inter-district communication but she suspected it was a good way to keep an eye on the Victors – there was no doubt whatsoever in her mind that the lines were tapped).

"-Fish Brain.

-Hello Johanna," there was a smile in Finnick's voice. "I didn't see you at the square.

-Tss, like I would go to that stupid reception. Watching two brainless lovebirds happily handing hands makes me wanna puke."

He laughed.

"-Really?

-Seriously, they look at each other like I look at whiskey, it's sickening." Finnick knew Johanna drank whiskey only when she had nothing else to drink, not even tea.

"-Oh, is little Johanna jealous that she couldn't find a Prince Charming? You know I could help you with that, right?" He purred. _What do you think of it?_

"-I might take you up on that offer, one day, just to annoy you.

-What, curious about what you haven't seen of me yet?" _Are you curious about her?_

"-Please, like I could ever want you." _I couldn't care less about her._ "Although I wouldn't mind you giving me a show, you know, just to make sure." _You are, you'll have to explain to me why._

"-All right then.

-Speaking of things I haven't seen, how are Annie and Mags?

-They're fine. Enjoying the nice weather and all.

-All right.

-Why did you call?

-Just needed a bit of sanity after this fucking evening of _sweet love_." The last two words were said in a voice so sweet she might have made her teeth rot. They had hung up after a bit more banter.

* * *

She had watched the rest of the Victory Tour. Finnick hadn't appeared on the television either when it was District 4's turn. Nothing special had happened.

Yet, there was something.

Something was happening which made something deep, oh so deep inside Johanna stir (too deep for her to acknowledge it).

Victors called one another. Mindless conversations on the tapped phone. Questions about futile things.

* * *

In her woods Johanna laughed. It was not a joyful laugh. It was full of anger and resentment and something else that was new. She acknowledged it but refused to give it a name (Finnick knew it was hope).

 _Mindless conversations of the phone…_

Fucking right.

In its effort to isolate and control them the Capitol had unknowingly offered the Victors the keys of their shackles.

Victors were all treated the same by the Capitol. What a glorious thing. Mindless conversations on the phone… between people who knew so well what the others were living they didn't need words to communicate anymore.

Because the Capitol made them go through the same things one way or another (the only difference was the extend of it) the Victors could communicate even on tapped lines.

So Johanna laughed.

Something was happening.

Something small, she didn't even know what exactly, but something that had the potential to be big. Finnick was right to be intrigued.

(But the girl and the boy were still pathetic in Johanna's mind.)

* * *

When they announced that 24 of them would have to go back into the nightmare that was the arena, Johanna yelled and screamed.

 _Those pieces of fucking shit!_

 _The bastards, those fucking bastards!_

There was no word that could possibly express her rage, her anger, her hatred.

 _Those motherfucking bastards._

How could they? No, how _dared_ they?

Hadn't they made their life miserable enough?

Anger, rage, abhorrence, injustice but not betrayal.

Betrayal would imply trust. She had had none for _them_.

And empowerment.

Once more the Capitol had made a mistake by trying to control (and eliminate) them.

Johanna's screams of hatred morphed into the laugh of those who have lost everything and are liberated by it.

That was it.

The Capitol could feel it.

The wind was changing.

Johanna laughed and laughed.

It was magnificent.

They would have to go back into the arena. One could hardly dream of a better admission of weakness.

The Capitol was slipping.

A Games of Victors.

Johanna laughed, now hysterical.

What a magnificent last ditch effort to control what they just _put_ in control by doing so.

* * *

When she was reaped Johanna smiled. A smile full of anger and malice and something else that made the crowd watching her shudder.

The Capitol had made a mistake. She would make them pay for it.

* * *

In the Capitol Johanna watched her fellow Victors.

Never had she seen so many of them at the same time.

She snickered.

Of course there would be many. There were 24 tributes and at least as many mentors.

Like many others Johanna paid attention to things for once. She observed, she listened.

Who in their right mind could have possibly thought that this was a good idea? How had they forgotten that they were _Victors_?

Not all Victors were like her (a well of hatred) but anyone would be a fool to think that they were ok with this. They had lived. Some of them had loved. And yet they were here.

Something was moving just beneath the surface, ready to explode and take everything with it. How could they not see that?

 _Stupid Capitol fools_.

Whatever happened in those Games would change Panem.

The Victors had been betrayed.

The Capitol was foolish if it thought for one moment that their Games would settle things down.

Never again would the Victors get caught off guards. Never again would they trust the Capitol. Never again. The Capitol just didn't realize it yet. These Games would be like nothing ever before.

* * *

Johanna watched closely. She watched closely as the girl who had unknowingly set the world on fire with a handful of berries finally appeared.

Johanna had to admit, she made a pretty impressive tribute in her black dress and her make-up worthy of a Goddess (but she hadn't proven herself to Johanna yet, she was still a little girl).

She watched as Finnick got caught in her flames, sugar cube in hand, lips at her ear, voice as purring as a panther lying on velvet.

She watched as he turned around and came to her, his smile the perfect mix of warm honey and razor blade.

"-Careful, little mermaid, fire burns.

-Oh, Johanna, worried for little ol' mer _man_ me?

-As if.

-So cold. Maybe you should let her thaw you heart a bit... Sugar cube?

-I think I'll wait and see if her flames are real." She took a sugar cube out of his hand. "Wouldn't want to get disappointed.

-I think we'll all be surprised."

* * *

She kept watching.

She watched as her fellow tributes trained and reacquainted themselves with the weapons and the different stations. She watched as the trainers adapted to having so peculiar trainees. She watched as some cringed at the lack of hesitation when Gloss threw his knives. She watched as some looked at Enobaria wearily. She watched as some were ignored by those who had nothing more to learn from them. She watched as they were thrown off by the very atmosphere of the training room.

They were used to having children. Frightened, hesitating, ignorant, innocent children. Even Career tributes didn't compare to Victors.

She sniggered when she tried to put herself in their shoes for a moment.

That's right. You wanted a show? You wanted Victors? There, you have us. Finally realizing we _are_ Victors?

Yes.

Johanna could see that some realized it, Atala first.

Watching them, some trainers realized that the Capitol wasn't as prepared as it would like to think for them.

Never before had the tributes been so close. Never before had they talked and laughed and enjoyed life together. Never before had the trainers had so little control over the trainees (and really, they did well not to expect anything else, they were all killers after all, masters of their trade). Never before had the tributes eaten together.

If Johanna didn't hate all that had to do with the Capitol on principle, she might have respected the trainers. They had an understanding of the Games nobody else had: not quite understanding of the horrors of the Games, but as close as anyone who had trained children to kill could come.

* * *

Johanna watched as the boy and the girl tried to get to know their fellow Victors. They were so young, so ignorant of the realities of the life of a Victor. They would never learn. Johanna was no fool. She knew that Katniss and Peeta would never get out of this arena to live as all the other Victors before them. Not if Snow had anything to say about it (which he did). A part of her resented them for it. Lucky them.

She watched as people watched her, the Girl on Fire. The girl didn't notice.

 _God this girl was ignorant!_

Johanna watched as her fellow Victors assessed her.

As Finnick watched her.

She was sure he didn't even realize he watched the girl so much. Others didn't either (after all, they _all_ watched _her_ ).

She watched as he approached her, making her jerk away from him at the knot station. She observed as he smiled, lips curled in a promise and an invitation, and as his hands tied a noose, fingers caressing the rope like he would a lover's skin.

She observed as he joked and laughed. He was seductive, tempting, charming.

He was Finnick Odair.

Johanna knew him better than he knew himself.

The noose around his neck and Katniss snorting and turning around, he laughed.

That laughed and what had come before it had been genuine.

He didn't even notice.

She didn't say anything.

 **[A/N 1]**

* * *

Like all the tributes (she might as well start thinking about herself as such) she watched as Katniss decided to stop playing nice and lost herself in the pull-release- _thwack_ of archery.

Johanna watched. She watched her face, she watched her body, she watched her eyes, she watched her arrows fly and make it to their target perfectly each and every time. She made eye contact with Finnick. He was smiling his I-told-you-so smile.

 _Annoying jerk._

As frustrating as it was Johanna had to admit that Katniss was indeed a Victor. No hesitation, body tensed but controlled. Breathing deep and steady. Eyes unwavering.

The girl was a Victor. A survivor.

And she could shoot like no one else.

All the same. Johanna wasn't ready to accept her just yet.

* * *

When she was on the stage, next to Caesar she poured out her anger.

 _Fuck them! Fuck them all!_

A part of her noticed how unsettled Caesar was. Caesar Flickerman was many things but stupid was not one of them. Despite her anger she could see in his eyes that he could feel it.

How could he not?

These interviews, they were nothing like the usual ones.

There was no getting to know the tributes. There was no angle to play. No children to put at ease. No sponsor to impress.

Instead there were Victors.

Instead there were people already known by all of Panem. People who were angry and who had finally decided to let the world know it.

Caesar Flickerman had received the message loud and clear.

Not the audience. Not the screaming dolls who were crying for Cashmere and Finnick.

But Caesar could read people like no other (was it not part of his job?) and he could see that the smile on Gloss' face was fake, fake and dangerous. He could see that Brutus had volunteered not out of thirst for blood but because he wanted to show the world what a cornered Victor was capable of.

When she screamed her anger at the world Johanna saw in Caesar's eyes a flicker of apprehension ( _that's right, Caesar, you have no idea what you Capitolites just unleashed_ ).

* * *

A fucking wedding dress.

For fuck's sake! That girl had no shame.

"-Snow made me wear it." And Johanna _saw_.

She finally saw what Finnick had seen all those months ago.

She saw the fire. She saw the anger.

She saw Katniss Everdeen.

She smiled.

"-Make him pay for it." _Give them hell_.

Katniss smiled back. Johanna felt her lips pull into a vicious smile.

* * *

She wanted to applaud. She wanted to howl. She wanted to laugh.

She heard Finnick's bark of laughter in the roar of the crowd.

In front of them Katniss, the Girl on Fire, the girl with balls of steel, ignited and silently screamed at Snow, framed in her smoking feathers, wings opened for the world to see.

 _Fuck you!_

She ignited them all.

* * *

They were no fools. There was no baby. All the Victors knew that.

But Peeta, as useless as he had been and would probably be in the arena, had managed the impossible. He had managed to make the multicolored thousands of the Capitol want to stop the Games.

* * *

Fists in the air, hands clasped with her fellows Victors' (they were no tributes at the moment, they were Victors, in all their glory and power), she wanted to scream _Fuck you, Snow! You didn't break us!_

* * *

The blood rain, however, almost broke Nuts and Volts.

Tsk.

She didn't really have anything personal against them other than the fact that they were so weird but she resented them for making her so vulnerable.

She was kind of happy to hear Finnick's voice.

Well, happy wasn't really what she felt (Johanna didn't _do_ happy). Relieved was more like it.

Relieved that he was still alive, relieved that Nuts' and Volts' lives didn't depend on her alone anymore and relieved that Katniss fucking Everdeen was still alive (really, had the girl dared to die, Johanna didn't know what she would have done but she was sure it wouldn't be pretty).

She was also sad to learn of Mags' death (Finnick didn't have to say anything). She had been a nice woman. She didn't deserve to die in here.

Unfortunately Katniss had the gall to act all precious and mighty. Now, Johanna wasn't really fond of her either but the little-miss-perfect attitude was seriously grating on her nerves.

Johanna's snapped her head to the woods when she heard the blood curdling shriek. Katniss bolted into the jungle, closely followed by Finnick. Johanna and the other two ran after them but smacked into a force field before reaching them.

She watched as Katniss and Finnick called after voices only they could hear. For one hour she watched them break down under the sounds of their loved ones' agony. She watched as they fell on their knees and curled up, hands squeezing their heads in an effort to block out the horror, bodies rocking back and forth, mouths open in a never ending scream.

When the hour came to an end the three of them ran to the tortured duo. They coaxed them back on their feet and brought them to the beach. Johanna half-carried Finnick to the water. She knew he would need its soothing contact to calm down. She looked at him closely.

His skin was pale and sweaty, his hands shaking, his eyes haunted, his breathing too rapid, almost hyperventilating, soft whimpers clawing their way out of his throat.

In that moment Johanna hated the Capitol for doing this to him. How could they, how dared they break him like this?

"-Finnick, snap out of it! It's over. You have to come back."

After a while his breathing deepened and slowed down. The whimpers slowly morphed into incoherent words, his voice shaking and ragged.

"-Finnick… Could hear them… Couldn't help…

-Finnick?" Finally his eyes seemed to focus and he looked at her, not fully in the moment yet, still seeing things the sounds had conjured up.

"-I could hear them, Johanna. They were screaming for me.

-It wasn't real. Beetee told you they could easily do it.

-I could hear them."

Johanna looked deep into his eyes. She saw that he wasn't ready to drop it yet. He was still in shock. (She swore she would put Snow's head on a spike for that.)

Her voice was unusually soft when she spoke again.

"-Who did you hear? Was it Annie?

-Annie. She screamed. She was in pain. She screamed for my help. But I couldn't help her. She wasn't there. And Mags.

-Mags? Mags is dead, Finnick, she couldn't have screamed for you.

-She was there. I could hear her. She screamed. Finnick, it hurts. It hurts so bad. Why did you abandon me? It hurts.

-Don't. Don't let it get to you. You know her. You know she would never have said something like that. She knew you didn't have a choice, didn't she? Let it go, Finn. Did you hear anybody else?"

Finnick's eyes flickered towards Katniss' direction.

The movement was so fast it couldn't have been anything intentional. It had been a reflex.

He didn't answer.

He didn't need to. Johanna understood.

She understood that the jabberjays hadn't stolen anyone else's voice. They didn't need to.

Katniss had been right next to him, screaming in agony. No jabberjay could have had the impact the real deal had.

Johanna doubted Finnick himself realized Katniss' screams had been as much a part of his torture as it was a consequence of hers.

Johanna sighed and looked around her. Finnick was finally silent. His hands had stopped shaking and his breathing was slowly stabilizing. His eyes were still distant but she could see he was putting himself back together. She sighed again.

* * *

She was glad she hadn't been caught in the jabberjays' wedge with them. She wasn't sure what would have happened. She didn't know what would have been worse: a deafening silence or screams that would reveal to the Capitol as well as to herself that she wasn't as uncaring as she thought she was.

* * *

She stood up and put her hand on Finnick's shoulder, squeezing lightly. She walked back to the sand. She would make the Capitol pay for what they were doing to them.

It was a promise.

* * *

 _ **AN 1** : If you want a great story about Finnick and Katniss, I recommand _Spark to Flame _, by Nikkette_ , _which starts more or less at that point in_ Catching Fire.

 _ **AN general** : ok so this is the first chapter that kind of starts diverging from canon with the jabberjay scene. I really like how it was in the book but in my opinion, the Capitol must have known that they'd eventually realize that it was all fake. Especially since they're allied with Beetee. Now my take on this is that since the Capitol knew they'd figure it out, they also knew it would somewhat lessen the impact of the torture, even if only afterwards. Knowing this, I don't put it past the Capitol to decide Fuck it, let's just screw with them. So, they decided that in addition to potentially real tortured screams of their very much alive loved ones, the tributes would also have to endure cries that they knew were fake but would still devastate them. In other words, the Capitol played on their fears and guilt even more so (for example Finnick blames himself for not being able to keep Mags alive any longer but cling to the idea that she died quickly in order to stay sane. The Capitol decided to literaly give a voice to his guilt)_

 _So yeah, that it basically how I view this..._

 _I also put quite a lot of emphasis on the Victors, and maybe some of you will think that it is too much, but this is an unexplored dimension that I really kinda liked in the book. I mean, before Katniss is in the Games, there are mentions of the Victors being special. I just thought it'd be nice to explore this a bit further. This will be a recurring themes in some of the next chapters._

 _And last, can you believe that my story (in my Word document) is already 28+K words?! And I'm so not done writing it! Damn, if only I could write my uni papers that fast and that easily!_

 _Anyway, until next time...! ;)_


	9. Chapter 9 - Caesar Flickerman

_Hello, good people of FF!_

 _Here is the new chapter. It is shorter than the previous one and than the next one but it is one of my favorites. I had a lot of trouble writing it and I'm not sure I'm entirely satisfied with it. Well, I am, but you will see that the end is... well it might seem a bit rough, like a first draft or something. It is not the case. It is my way of conveying the confusion about the whole situation (you'll get it when you're done reading)._

 _I will write another chapter about this character to continue to explore his POV but it will probably come way later, so be patient._

 _Last piece of info: I wrote this based on the movie more than the book. I just find this part of the movie so perfect and so full of something that is left unsaid that I couldn't pass up the opportunity to dissect it. I hope you'll like my take on this._

 _So keep the movie scene in ming while reading it. In fact, I suggest that you open a Youtube tab (Catching Fire - Tributes Interview) and keep it open while you read to replay the scene as you read._

 _I don't know when the next update is. The next chapter should be about Gloss but I'm not done writing it._

 _Enjoy!_

 _Until next time ;)_

* * *

 **They watched**

 **Caesar Flickerman**

Caesar knows he is one of the symbols of the Capitol.

Everyone in Panem knows who he is and what he does.

Nobody _really_ knows who he is, though.

Caesar could tell you who he is, where he comes from, who were his parents, how his childhood was. He could.

But he won't.

This is not important.

And nobody cares anyway.

Nobody really cares about anything in the Capitol.

And they forget all too quickly who a person is and where she or he comes from.

Or even that this person is human altogether.

Tributes are not human. Not in the eyes of the Capitol.

And for a long time, not in Caesar's eyes either.

But it changed quickly when he became the Master of Ceremonies and main host for the Hunger Games.

One does not simply pretend that those children are not human when one has to shake trembling and sweaty hands with them.

In his long career Caesar has shaken his fair share of on-the-verge-of-breaking tribute hands. He has seen the fear in their eyes more often than not.

Caesar is rich. Tremendously rich. He could have stopped his career long ago but chose not to. Hosting is what he does best, there's no reason for him to stop.

And tributes fascinate him.

He knows that his fascination with them was morbid at first. Just a Capitol citizen thrilled to get so close to _them_.

It had changed when their humanity slapped him in the face.

The fascination stayed but it morphed into a less sordid interest.

He wanted to make them unforgettable to the world, just like every one of them was for him, if only just for a moment. Let them shine, those children whose light would soon be lost forever.

All but one.

Now, the _Victors_ , those are the ones who truly fascinate Caesar. Or more exactly, the transformation from tribute to Victor.

Capitolites change almost everything about themselves. Even Caesar doesn't escape the norm. His body hasn't change for decades now; he makes sure of that. But someone might alter every single detail of his or her body and still wouldn't come even close to the complete and utter transformation undergone by a Victor.

And that fascinates Caesar.

It fascinates him to try and see the future Victor in each tribute. Who will make the jump? Who will come back and shake his hand again, this time maybe trembling but in a whole different way?

In his long career Caesar has shaken his fair share of Victor's hands. The thrill of it is like no other.

Even though those hands become mentor's hands, they always remain Victor's hands underneath the surface.

A Victor's hand has nothing on a Victor's eyes.

It's ultimately in the eyes that the transformation is the most profound.

Caesar likes to think he has a special kind of connection with the eyes of the Victors. He knows them all, all those same eyes of Victors. Yet each Victor has different eyes.

A part deep inside of Caesar is deeply afraid of those eyes.

Victor's eyes are eyes that have looked into the abyss. Eyes from which the abyss stares back into Caesar every time he shakes their hands, seeing deep inside him, in his core, and telling him so many things.

Victors make Caesar uncomfortable. Some more than others.

Because Caesar knows.

In his long career Caesar has gotten really good at reading people. It is part of his job, after all.

In his long career Caesar had observed a lot of Victors. He has seen them all: triumphant Careers, lost girls, angry boys, beautiful, ugly, smiling, crying, trembling, joking… No two Victors are the same.

On the surface.

Underneath the makeup and the acts, Caesar has learned to see the Victors for who they were and most importantly, who they are.

People one step away from their breaking point, from snapping and become something Caesar doesn't know how to define.

What scares Caesar is that he knows many of them are not on the _not yet_ side of that line, that breaking point anymore. They are all one step _away_ from it, but only a few are one step _back_ from it; too many are already one step _beyond_.

Victors make Caesar uncomfortable because being directly into contact with someone so close to that line makes him question everything. From what has happened to them to make them snap, to what it means to be human.

Deep, deep, deep down inside, in a part of himself Caesar fears to acknowledge even exists, it makes him question the legitimacy of the Games. And deeper still, the legitimacy of a government that would not only condone them but encourage and strive on them. Caesar is not strong enough to ever admit this exists in him.

If he were, he would also admit this was part of the reason why Victors have always made him feel uncomfortable.

But never before had Caesar Flickerman felt as uncomfortable as now.

He really shouldn't feel this uncomfortable. He was in known territory: interviewing tributes before the Games, interviewing Victors, mentors, interviewing Gloss, who he had now known for years. Gloss, despite his size, has always been one of the Victors who made Caesar less uncomfortable.

Now standing on the stage he has worked on for years, Caesar feels as if a bucket of ice has been poured over him.

"-We're not going by choice."

One sentence.

One sentence is all Caesar needs to understand that these Games are, indeed, something no one has ever seen before and will never see again.

Caesar starts to suspect he will soon be happy about that.

Gloss, Victor of the 63rd Hunger Games, perfect District 1 tribute, Victor and mentor, _volunteer_ for the third Quarter Quell, has just told the world that he is _not_ going back into the arena by choice.

Caesar has always been fascinated by a Victor's hand and eyes.

But for the very first time in his long career Caesar is confronted by a Victor' smile.

Gloss' smile.

This is not the I-just-got-out-of-the-arena lower-case-victor smile. This is not the mentor smile. This is not the interview smile.

That smile is the sign that Gloss has just crossed the line.

A line Caesar hadn't even been aware existed.

Not the line between a tribute and a Victor. Not the line between sanity and insanity.

No.

This was the line between a Capitol Victor and a Hunger Games Victor.

The Capitol has crossed a line.

A shiver runs up Caesar's spine.

Underneath the makeup, Caesar Flickerman can see the edge of the razor sharp blade of that smile.

He is still shaking off the effects of that smile when Enobaria comes onto the stage.

For the first time Caesar sees her golden teeth as something else than a fashion trend she set up years ago. Not something _more_ , something _else_ entirely. Was it ever a fashion trend at all?

This woman Caesar is smiling to, this hand that Caesar is shaking, is a weapon.

Caesar knows he is successful in hiding his uneasiness from the audience but he can't shake the growing feeling that he is moving around on an unstable ground.

When Brutus, strong, imposing, victorious Brutus walks back to his seat, his back exposed to the audience yet still making him feel like a prey, Caesar Flickerman realizes that for the first time in his long career he doesn't run the show.

He tries grasping back tendrils of control but Beetee, in his nervous but soft voice, questions the legality of the Games.

Caesar realizes that the Victors are done playing.

For the first time in his career, in his life, the tributes are not the only ones playing. No, this isn't true. They have never played. The Capitol was playing. Caesar was playing. Tributes have never played. And now, these tributes, these Victors, have brought the arena here, onto the stage.

They have been forced back into the arena. They had decided that they wouldn't go in alone. They would bring the whole Capitol with them. And Caesar was just a lamb in a war of wolves. Only, he wasn't so sure who the wolves were fighting anymore.

This is not an unstable ground Caesar is walking on. Not even shifting sands. This is a slippery slope in a hail storm, and there is nothing Caesar can do to keep upright.

He tries to minimize the words but deep down he knows it is useless – and even deeper, he is not sure he disagrees with them.

He is relieved when Finnick arrives on stage. Finnick knows how to play by the rules. Caesar knows that the youngest Victor will allow him a small reprieve.

But there is just something in Finnick's expression. Caesar knows he's not going to have his reprieve. He recognizes the expression for what it is: Finnick is angry. Caesar knows that Finnick could easily smile for the camera. He has done so for years. And he does now. But his smile is not a smile. It's a smirk. It's a snarl. It's words bitten onto to keep from escaping. It's a shout camouflaged as a snigger. It's a Victor's smile that threatens to reveal itself.

And only then come Finnick's words. They're perfectly camera safe. They're a goodbye to his one true love.

They are a threat. A promise.

The soft words are the deafening sound of Finnick's leash being torn to shreds by the very cage he is forced back into.

Fortunately for Caesar the next few Victors are easier to handle. At least verbally. Caesar can't shake the uneasiness the Victors of District 6 inspire in him with their morphling-distant eyes.

Johanna Mason's yells of hate and anger shouldn't have surprised Caesar. He should have expected her to do something like that. She has always been fiery since her Games. But Caesar is shaken up nonetheless.

Her anger shakes him because in that moment he is without a doubt that had she been holding her ax, Caesar Flickerman would be bloody pieces on the glowing stage.

Woof and Cecelia break Caesar's heart. Caesar feels disgusted with himself as Cecelia thanks her husband for the happiness and the three children he has given her and whom she will never see again, who will be forced to watch as their mother is killed in a circus.

Woof's body and mind have started to break down after years and years on living. He is barely able to get through his interview because of his failing ears. Caesar feels less than human for participating in the masquerade that sends this old man to his death. He should be allowed to finish his life in dignity, not covered by layers of makeup trying to hide his wrinkles. Mags was easier to face. At least she had chosen to be there (Caesar refused to think about her reasons or how wrong it was that this was even possible).

The next interviews are a breeze compared to the rest. Even Chaff's drunkenness. Caesar is used to that. He can work with it. He is even glad for it. He embraces the stability of this known territory before the hurricane that it sure to be District 12's interviews.

And a hurricane it is. Caesar tries, he tries to diffuse whatever explosive has just been armed by the smoke and flames and black and feathers. But he knows, deep down, in his bones, at his very core, Caesar knows that it is too late. As Katniss Everdeen spreads her wings for the world to see, he knows the game is over. He knows that the Mockingjay has set the world on fire. And really, he should have expected it. Was he not the one to nickname her the Girl on Fire?

Caesar dares not turn to watch the Victors' reactions to the flight of the bird. He suspects he heard a bark of laughter or two, and sharp intakes of breath. No, these are not intakes of breath, these are sharp relieved sighs.

When it is Peeta's turn, Caesar is relieved. He knows he shouldn't feel hopeful, that until now hope has been futile. But he also knows that Peeta is finely aware of what he can and cannot tell. Caesar has always liked Peeta. That kid, no, man, is even more skilled than Caesar is at moving the crowds. Caesar knows that Peeta knows just how dangerous and explosive this situation is. Surely, he will try to diffuse it.

Only he doesn't. He doesn't diffuse it. He doesn't disarm the bomb. In fact, he makes it explode and adds shrapnel to it.

In the roars of the Capitol crowd Caesar hears the cries of war of Panem.

When he sees the Victors join hands and stand, Caesar is swept by emotions. Before him stand 24 Victors, 24 tributes and Victors of the Hunger Games. They have always fascinated him but in this moment, this fascination crystallizes in something more. Or maybe is shattered. He isn't sure.

Caesar has always fancied himself as having a special kind of bond with the tributes and the Victors.

As 24 of them face him now and face the world, Caesar finds them glorious, magnificent and terrifying.

The Capitol forgets that tributes are human.

Caesar now understands that these Victors are indeed not human, but they are not less than human. They have become something beyond that. Something beautiful and terrible. Powerful beyond his comprehension.

In his bones, Caesar knows that these Games are going to change the world, that these people, who have been changed so deeply by the Capitol, are going to change the world.

When the lights of the stage go out, Caesar feels terrified. He is alone in a room plunged in the darkness with killers who have nothing to lose. What is more terrifying is that this is true both literally and figuratively.

Caesar has always been fascinated by tributes and Victors, by how they were changed by the Games.

Caesar has always been good at reading people.

Caesar has always been in control of the crowds.

Caesar has always been many things.

But now, for the life of him, Caesar couldn't tell what he is or what he feels.

He is lost.

What had just happened?

In that moment, Caesar Flickerman only knows one thing: the Victors are done playing the game.


	10. Chapter 10 - Gloss

_Hello, people!_

 _Yes, I am alive! I am not fully settled in my new life yet (far from that) but I finally finished this chapter!_

 _I've had some troubles writing it to my satisfaction, I have to admit... And frankly, had I had the opportunity to discuss it more with AlbinoWings, it certainly would have been different but here is the version I like most and which is most aligned with the whole story._

 _Anyways..._

 _Oh! Sorry to say, but don't get your hopes up for a quick update of the next chapter. I'm not done writing it yet and I basically have no time to myself for now..._

 _On the positive side, this 10th chapter is quite long so it should keep you going until the next one ;)_

 _Oh! Last but not least: thank you all so much for your support, reviews, favoriting and following! This is so nice!_

 _Enjoy!_

 _(PS: I'm typing on my tablet so there might have some spelling mistakes or even weird words due to autocorrect... Sorry! I'm trying to correct everything, but some mistakes may pass by me)_

* * *

 **They Watched -** **Chapter 10**

 **Gloss**

Regrets.

There are a lot of things that Gloss regrets.

There are also a lot he doesn't.

If Gloss had to admit to having one regret, his biggest one, it would be his regret not to have lived his life fully. Not really.

Don't get him wrong, he has enjoyed his life. Some parts less than others but he has enjoyed it.

But as his blade slits open the throat of a woman who has always been nice to him, he knows that he hasn't really lived.

He isn't sure regret really is what he feels though.

He has always been told he didn't have the mental capacity for any complex emotion. Or for anything complex for that matter.

He knows it isn't true when he regrets never proving those who told him this that he is more than just muscles and a pretty face.

All his life Gloss has been treated like the Victor that he is.

All the children in District 1 are.

They are treated like Victors because that's what they have to be. Victors. Anything less would be a disgrace.

There have never been a lot of children in District 1. Having children puts too much strain on the mothers' body. It damages it too much. Makes it ugly.

In a district where beauty is everything, getting pregnant is something people pity you for.

Fortunately all the children are beautiful (Gloss has always made it a point not to ask if this was natural or if one look at the pregnancy rate and the kindergarten records would reveal a darker truth).

The names are also a way to _make_ the children beautiful.

Gloss knows what the other districts think of District 1's names. They find them ridiculous. He finds them ridiculous too. But in 1 parents name their children after beautiful things in the hope that they will become beautiful too; that such beautiful names will compensate for the ugliness of the pregnancy and labor.

Families are required to have at least one child so that the population doesn't dwindle.

Gloss and Cashmere are an exception. Two children in one family is almost unheard of.

Gloss doesn't know why his parents had her sister. He doesn't know if she was intended or not. He's never asked.

It never mattered.

He loves her.

Their childhood hadn't been a happy one. Not really. Their mother had resented Cashmere for "ruining her body". And yet she had always paraded both of them around. For their beauty.

Even by District 1 standards Gloss and Cashmere have always been beautiful indeed.

When he turned 5 Gloss was entered in the Academy. Like all children were. Finally liberating his parents from the burden of taking care of him.

He would only see them again when they would come to bring his sister when she would turn 5. And never again after that.

In the Academy he was to be groomed to be a Victor.

Despite the low number of children in the district, competition is fierce. There is nothing more important than volunteering for the Games and coming back victorious.

Victorious is the only way to come back, anyway.

At age 6 Gloss was happy to see his sister again after one year.

The other trainees made fun of them.

 _Freaks._

 _What had their mother do to deserve a second pregnancy?_

Gloss and Cashmere had clung to each other. They did not care what the others thought. They had each other.

And they would get the others' respect soon enough.

For District 1 respected power and beauty more than they despised pregnancy.

And Gloss and Cashmere were nothing if not beautiful and powerful.

They soon became the best of their respective age groups.

Gloss received the permission to volunteer for the 63rd Hunger Games. He was deemed strong enough to be allowed to represent the district.

Losing was not an option. He could not lose. Not when Cashmere would be the one to take the fall if he did.

So he had won.

He had won by ripping through the other tributes with his knives like diamond cut through glass.

Gloss had always been the best in the Academy. He was the perfect tribute.

He had reveled in his power. He was a god in the arena.

When he was crowned it was only natural. After all, he was the best.

He reveled in the glory, in the attention.

People desired him.

He graced them with his presence.

One year of celebration and pleasure later Cashmere had volunteered.

She could never _not_ volunteer.

Gloss hadn't really been proud of her when she had won: he had _known_ she would.

It was only natural.

She had been magnificent in her arena.

Pride wasn't what he had felt.

Smugness was closer to it.

It hadn't last long.

In the middle of the celebration, when President Snow had crowned Cashmere, he had congratulated her and told her that people desired her. She had thanked him.

She hadn't understood.

Not yet.

Gloss too had been blissfully oblivious, too high on the adrenalin of her winning and the hands caressing his body.

He had only understood two days later when he had found Cashmere scrubbing herself raw in the shower, her yells and sobs barely muffled by the scalding hot water pelting the floor and her skin.

Worry had been the first emotion Gloss had felt.

Disbelief had been the second one when he had managed to make sense of her sobbed and hashed sentences while he draped her in a large towel and carried her to her bed.

Then emotions had warred inside of him at the same time.

Rage.

Sadness.

Betrayal.

Regret.

Anger.

Rage for what they had done to her. To his baby sister.

Sadness also, for what had been done to her.

Betrayal at the Capitol.

Regret for not having been able to protect her.

Anger for having been too stupid to understand, to see, to let himself be used without even realizing it.

How stupid had he been never to realize that he was the one being played? Not the women he ditched after a few days. But him.

Reality had slammed into him like the tribute train.

How could he have not seen it?

That night he had held Cashmere in his arms as she fell asleep, exhausted.

The very next day Gloss had demanded an audience with President Snow. He had obtained it and stormed his way inside the audience room.

When he had finally expulsed the last breath of air out of his lungs in a plea not to do this to her the President had laughed.

"-Oh but be grateful you didn't have to _mentor_ her. After all, you have been quite good at your… _profession_ for a year now, it would only be logical for you to show her the ropes, don't you think? That is what mentors are for, is it not? And you are her senior Victor, which makes you her mentor, if I am not mistaken. Fortunately for me her _inexperience_ until yesterday was highly valuable. I was assured you that you sister was as high class as all that your district produces. She can be proud to perpetuate the good reputation of your industry. As her colleague I can only advise you to make sure she remains the best. And as a mentor I can only advise you to set a good example. Wouldn't it be tragic if one of you was to get hurt because the other is unreliable?"

Gloss had never let himself forget that monologue.

And even if he had wanted to, how could he ever?

Left without a choice, he and Cashmere had bent to the Capitol's depravity.

Women, men, it didn't matter.

Gloss had never really minded what was done to him. His body had never truly belonged to him anyway. But he resented that it was imposed to his sister.

He knew Cashmere wasn't happy.

What a joke.

Cashmere was the furthest from happy one could get.

The year of the 67th Hunger Games was the first time Gloss had felt disgusted with himself.

Not that the choice had been his. Not at all. But it didn't make it any less wrong.

The year of the 67th Hunger Games was the year one Finnick Odair turned 16.

That year, Gloss had been _asked_ to mentor him.

Gloss had been raised to admire beauty. It was inevitable that he would see it.

Finnick was beautiful. More so than Gloss and Cashmere put together. Tragically so.

The young Victor had been doomed from the moment he volunteered.

The kid had been raw. There had been so many emotions in his eyes when Gloss had seen him in private. The victorious teenager from the Victory Tour two years before was nowhere to be found.

Finnick was also strong.

So strong despite his age and most of all, despite what was happening to him.

He had quickly schooled his features into his Victor face.

Gloss never knew who Finnick was protecting by accepting this but he knew he would never dare threaten this person in any way, shape or form. Because even if Finnick Odair was like a twig compared to Gloss' massive muscular frame, there had been no mistaking the fierce look in his eyes when he had looked at Gloss square in the eye and said _Let's do this_.

Gloss has always respected Finnick immensely for that. For his strength.

There was no mistaking that Finnick was a Victor. He was one through and through.

Gloss had felt even more disgusted with himself when he had swallowed the green liquid he had been _advised_ to drink and that would take control of his body and make it impossible for him _not_ to touch the young Victor.

The taste of bile had stayed on his tongue for a long time after that. Gloss hadn't been able to keep anything down for weeks.

Gloss had rubbed himself raw after teaching (touching?) Finnick. He hadn't even been allowed to keep his blisters longer than the time it took his prep-team to see them.

Gloss never knew who had been designated for the female part of Finnick's _formation_. It hadn't been Cashmere. He never asked.

One week later the 67th Hunger Games had started, along with Finnick's new career.

Like in everything he did, Finnick was a natural.

Gloss and Finnick never touched again. And they never spoke about _that_ day.

They developed a strong bond. A friendship and understanding forged in harshness, injustice and common suffering.

They never talked about their work as prostitutes.

They actually barely talked at all.

Their bond wasn't one made of words.

Despite the fact that Finnick had been a Career tribute too, a distance remained between them. It was often the case between Victors from Districts 1 and 2 and the others.

Gloss knew it was because of the districts' relation with the Capitol.

Gloss was pretty sure he was an exception in his District for resenting the Capitol. The other Victors were everything that could be expected from Careers. But they hadn't been betrayed like Gloss had been. They didn't have a sister who was forced to whore herself out.

Nevertheless, Gloss never went against the Capitol. He wouldn't risk Cashmere's life. And what good would it do to go against them anyway? What could an ant like him do?

And really, as long as he and Cashmere complied, life wasn't that bad.

But there had been a few close calls..

Gloss remembers the two times he _almost_ rebelled.

The first time had been about an offer. He had had to perform together with another Victor.

Who was rich enough to afford two Victors at the same time?

Gloss had almost declined despite knowing the risks. He had sworn to himself that he would _never_ touch another Victor after Finnick.

Not Victors.

Women, men, young, old, it didn't matter. But not Victors.

Victors should be respected, not used. And certainly not against one another.

When Cashmere _slipped_ on the stairs on her way back from one appointment and broke her arm, Gloss had accepted.

He couldn't risk her.

In the end, he had had to perform at the same time as Brutus from District 2 but not together or with the same person (there had been enough people in the room for them to be thoroughly busy and never come close to each other anyway).

The second time Gloss almost rebelled had comeyears later. Very recently, in fact.

The time he _had_ rebelled occurred around the 72nd Games.

Recent Victor Johanna Mason had just lost her entire family. That move had been a sloppy one on the Capitol's part. They had left no one to use against her.

Cashmere had been _offered_ her contract instead, since the Victor from 7 refused to perform.

A join contract.

A join contract with Gloss – that had been news to him, too.

They had refused.

The depravity of the Capitol may have no limit but they did. And this was it.

Gloss was threatened with Cashmere's death if he didn't comply.

Cashmere was threatened with his if she didn't.

They had chosen to die.

The contract had been retracted.

They were too valuable to die. For now.

The couple who had extended the offer had been given Finnick as compensation.

It had been a good compensation. A lot less people could afford Finnick Odair than Cashmere and Gloss. Even together.

In the last few years Finnick had made himself one hell of a luxury good.

As punishment they had had to watch.

The clients had had special tastes; and despite the fact that they had been offered Finnick Odair, they had wanted two people.

So the clients had dashed out on Finnick for two.

He had had to stay on bed rest for two days and have a full body polish after that.

Gloss and Cashmere had thrown up more times that they could count while nursing him back to health.

Gloss hates and admires Finnick for never resenting them.

The next couple of years had passed by without anymore incident or anymore join offer.

Or anymore rebellion on their part.

Then had come the 74th Hunger Games.

Gloss could honestly say that he did not think anything special about those Games. For him it was just one more year of dead tributes (or at least one of them). He would only have very few appointments this year: it was his turn – and Cashmere's – to mentor.

It was also Brutus' and Enobaria's for their district.

Gloss was fine with that: they were all on friendly enough terms, and Career mentors were used to working together.

Even as soon as the Reaping it was made evident that District 1 wouldn't win this year. Marvel and Glimmer were finely trained but Cato had more rage.

This year Career pack would be limited to the tributes of 1 and 2: no one had volunteered in 4, which meant the tributes weren't Careers. Even though the girl from 4 seemed strong, she wasn't up to the Career standards.

Gloss hadn't been worried about the Games. His tributes would most likely be killed by natural causes or by their fellow Careers. Like always. It was very rare for a Career to be killed by a regular tribute.

Gloss, Cashmere, Brutus and Enobaria had been in the common viewing room to watch the recap of the Reapings. Their tributes had deemed it unnecessary and a loss of time and had preferred to stay in their respective rooms.

Gloss couldn't care less: he was just there to get sponsors. Training the tributes and telling them how to behave was the Academy's job, not his.

Of all the tributes, none had really stood out. Maybe the big guy from 11. And the girl from 12 for volunteering.

Brutus and Enobaria had laughed at her.

Gloss and Cashmere almost had too: she wouldn't last a day in the arena. She was petite and thin. A twig.

But she had volunteered to save her sister. They respected that. Even if she was most likely going to die in the bloodbath, they would at least respect her for her bravery and not mock her.

The Opening ceremony had been more interesting than other years, what with the flashy entrance of District 12.

Other than that nothing really had stood out of the ordinary.

Marvel's and Glimmer's account of the first few days of training had revealed few surprises. The tributes from 2 were as skilled as could be expected. One boy had a limp – bloodbath. The girl from 5 was smart and fast. The guy from 11 was strong but kept to himself. District 12 was nothing special and kept to themselves, too. All in all, a fairly normal batch of tributes even though Gloss knew not to rule out anything.

As the days passed by Gloss could feel a certain excitement buzzing around. He couldn't quite put his finger on it but there was a little something in the air that wasn't usually there. He put it down to the refreshing and unusual presence of some sort of backbone in the poorer districts' tributes.

The male from 12 revealed himself to be stronger than anticipated. After discussing it with the other mentors, they had encouraged their tributes to include him into the Career pack. The teenagers had been less than thrilled.

Soon it had been time for the individual training scores to be announced. Gloss had been quite satisfied with his tributes, although Glimmer was definitely not the best District 1 had ever produced.

Gloss had frowned when Katniss Everdeen had received an 11. That definitely had been a surprise. Marvel and Glimmer hadn't been happy with that.

Gloss had been intrigued. What had she done, that girl from 12 of all places, to get such high a score?

He had warned his tributes to look out for her. They had sniggered.

For all that was said about the poorest district, an 11 was nothing to scoff at.

The only times 12 had produced Victors were the Quarter Quells, something people tended to forget. That had to mean something. District 12 might surprise them yet.

Gloss had remembered his visit to the coal district during his Victory Tours, so many years before. It had been a drab and dull place. At the time, he had been more disgusted than anything by the poor quality of the feast and of the whole town.

But.

There had been a 'but'.

There had been a latent hostility in 12 that he had not truly managed to shake off during his stay.

An energy in people's eyes. Oh, not the people at the feast. Those had been empty blue merchant eyes. But the grey eyes of the streets. Those eyes had looked at Gloss with hidden contempt.

Who were these people to dare look at him, a Victor, a Career, with anything but admiration in their eyes?

Gloss remembers being so stupid, so naïve, so vain.

Haymitch Abernathy had been obnoxious at the ceremony. Gloss had despised him. In his young Career mind, he had associated the contempt people in 12 seemed to held for him with the sad excuse of a Victor the drunkard was.

Now, years later, Gloss had gotten to know the man a bit better. Not by much, mind you. But Gloss had matured and he had now been around enough to recognize the Victor in Haymitch.

The man was a drunk and a moron, there was no doubt about that.

But he was a dangerous moron.

There was an edge to Haymitch Abernathy that new Victor Gloss had been unable to see.

Gloss vaguely remembers watching the Second Quarter Quell but he had been too young to fully understand what was happening.

One day Gloss had managed to get one of his clients, the wife of a Gamemaker, to give him an uncut copy of the 50th Games. He had watched it alone, curious about whom Haymitch Abernathy was.

He had come to view the drunkard in a whole new light after that. His victory hadn't been particularly spectacular (except maybe the part about him literally spilling his guts all over the place).

No. What had made Gloss weary of Haymitch Abernathy was everything before that, from his Reaping to his laugh when the rock had come flying back from the force field.

Gloss had realized that Haymitch Abernathy had been mocking the Capitol for years, camouflaging it behind his drinking.

For all the scenes Abernathy had ever caused, Gloss had seen how sharp his eyes actually were. How sharp his sneers.

Haymitch Abernathy was a Victor through and through.

A score of 11 with Haymitch Abernathy for mentor definitely promised a surprise in the arena.

The first day of the Games had arrived two days later.

Almost all the mentors had been in the common viewing room – even though they would watch the rest of the Games in their private viewing rooms, they liked to be in the common one at the very beginning.

The Games would start soon.

Brutus had made a mocking comment about the coming bloodbath.

When the camera had zoomed in on Katniss Everdeen's face Claudius Templesmith had made a comment about her burning out.

Haymitch had snickered.

Gloss had frowned.

The gong had boomed and blood had started to flow.

The Careers had dominated the field.

Gloss had vaguely noticed the girl evading one of Clove's knives and running away from the Cornucopia with a backpack – and the knife.

The next few hours had been nothing unusual: the Careers had stayed at the Cornucopia and had taken their pick of the weapons before starting to hunt down other tributes. Just as they had been getting ready to go, the male tribute from 12 had marched up to them, unarmed but confident and asking if the offer for an alliance still stood. After a few exchanged glances they had given him a weapon and left, all five of them. It was already getting dark by then.

The four mentors of the Career pack had gone into one of their private viewing rooms. Career mentors tended not to stay with the others since they already were in an alliance. Also, the others were generally not too fond of them and their coldness towards the tributes.

Cashmere had scoffed when Glimmer had left the tribute for dead but no canon had sounded. Gloss had had to agree: this girl was no District 1 material.

The four of them had watched intently as the pack passed just under Everdeen's tree without noticing her.

That girl could become a problem.

Gloss had amended that thought when she had stayed away from everyone. The Gamemakers would get her.

They almost did.

They got her leg.

And had driven her straight to the pack.

She had managed to evade the five of them and had quickly climbed up a tree.

She had taunted them, had mocked them, had made a fool out of their training and districts. Even more so when Glimmer shamefully missed her with an arrow – seriously who had authorized that girl to volunteer back in 1?!

Hours later Gloss had been jerked awake from his nap by Cashmere's yells of _What the Hell?!_

His attention had snapped back to the TV screen only to see a swarm of trackerjackers angrily swoop in onto his tributes.

His mind had been torn between anger at the girl for having killed Glimmer and admiration for her sheer nerve.

She definitely had become a problem.

Although he had been angry at the loss of a tribute, Gloss had known that Glimmer would never have made it.

And _come on_ , how long had it been since someone had dared attack the Careers like that? Had anyone ever even done that? The girl deserved some respect just for that.

Gloss had decided to seek out one Haymitch Abernathy. Marvel would be out of commission for the next couple of days, there would be no point in staying in front of the television.

When he had found him, Haymitch was sipping coffee – undiluted _coffee_ \- in the buffet room, sprawled on the sofa.

The older mentor had smiled into his mug when Gloss entered.

"-Hello, One."

His tone had been mocking. Gloss had had to fight down a frown.

"-Twelve.

-Why the long face? Need a drink to take the _sting_ out of the long night?"

Gloss had just known that he was trying to get a rise out of him. It had almost worked.

"-Interesting tribute you have there.

-Which one?

-You know which one."

Abernathy had just smiled. Gloss would have to be the one taking the first step.

"-Who is she?

-Who is she, indeed?

-Abernathy.

-Why do you wanna know?

-Call it curiosity about who just offed my kid.

-Aah. That one stung, hm? The tribute from 1 getting her pretty little face up in the sky because of a girl from 12 of all places."

Gloss had wanted to answer with something definitely not nice but this was the Victor of the Quarter Quell he had been talking to. And Gloss wanted to get answers from him.

"-It certainly was unexpected.

-I'd say!

-So…

-So?

-Are you gonna answer?

-Answer what?" Gloss sighed. "Will you stop that! Who is she?

-Katniss Everdeen, female tribute of District 12 for the 74th Hunger Games…" Abernathy had drawled his sentence out, looking at his mug of coffee like it held the answers of the universe. He had started talking again just before Gloss snapped and left. "Also known as the Girl on Fire and soon-to-be known as the Victor of the 74th Hunger Games.

-Ok, never mind." Gloss had moved to leave

"-Oh I'm not joking." Haymitch had snapped his eyes onto Gloss. The taunting smile gone from his face and voice. "You Careers just watch her. She's gonna blow these Games.

-What makes you so sure she can kill Cato, Clove and Marvel?

-See, that's the thing with you, Careers. You think in terms of kill. And that's exactly what's gonna get'em, those pretty little killers of yours. She thinks in terms of _survival_. She doesn't _need_ to kill them. She just needs to outlive them and, believe me, Sweetheart is nothing if not a survivor.

-Sweetheart?

-Oh she's a peach! You would actually like her, I'm sure. Almost chopped my fingers off on the train.

-Right.

-Fine, don't believe me. But I'll tell you now because you probably won't be around when the time comes: I told you so." Abernathy had left right after that, murmuring about getting sponsors for _Little Miss Sunshine_.

Gloss hadn't known what to make of this conversation.

As predicted the next couple of days had been quiet.

Unlike usual Gloss had decided to make a few appearances in the common room. He needed to feel up the atmosphere.

He remembers being confused by how friendly Katniss had been with the little girl from 11. Why would she take care of her like that?

Gloss had been in the common room when Katniss Everdeen had decided to pulverize the Careers' supplies.

If it had been in his temperament Gloss would have laughed at the stunned silence in the room. At his own face too, probably. At the sheer nerves of that wisp of a girl. At Cato's almost comical rage.

But he hadn't laugh.

 _You Careers just watch her. She's gonna blow these Games._ The gruff voice of sober Abernathy had rung in his head.

She had done just that.

Gloss had been back in the private viewing room with only Cashmere when they watched Marvel sneak up on the little girl and Katniss. He had thrown his spear in a perfect movement. His arm was still in the finishing part of the throw when blood had started spurting out of his throat.

 _What the hell?!_

How fast had she fired that arrow?

She hadn't even waited for the canon to sound before turning back to the girl, sure of her kill.

It had been quick.

Gloss was sure Marvel hadn't seen that one coming. Gloss certainly hadn't.

Gloss and Cashmere hadn't stayed long after that. They had no reason to stay in the Capitol. Doing so would be asking to get clients.

Nine days later Gloss had been astounded to watch the girl from District 12 get crowned together with her male counterpart.

 _And soon-to-be known as the Victor of the 74_ _th_ _Hunger Games._

 _I told you so._

Who the hell was this girl?!

Six months later Gloss still hadn't found an answer. He had hoped to do so soon, when she would visit for the Victory Tour.

The first stop had been District 11 and the most recent Victors had once again done what nobody had ever done before.

Could the guy actually give away a part of their winning to those families?

Gloss just knows something had happened after that that hadn't been shown on the television: the following speeches had all been Capitol-perfect.

Not one Victor was to be seen in the attendance of the ceremonies. District 1 had been no exception.

Katniss Everdeen and Peeta Mellark had had their Capitol faces on the whole time.

Gloss still didn't know who she was but whoever that had been had been crushed by the Capitol. She was by then a soon-to-be married perfect little Victor.

Gloss had lost all interest in her by then.

Nothing of interest had filtered anyway. All that he had heard about her was that wedding gown number 15 through 11 had been eliminated and she would soon reveal the pictures of her in the 10 remaining competing dresses.

Then one day she had stopped a lashing by taking one to the face on national television. The broadcast had been cut so fast Gloss wasn't sure whether what he had seen had actually happened.

Who was this girl? This girl who dropped trackerjackers on the Careers, who blew up their supplies in broad daylight, who survived a pack of mutts _and_ a Career out for her blood at the same time, who brought back her fellow tribute out of the arena with her and who opposed a Head Peacekeeper in the town square in front of the cameras?

This girl the whole Capitol had been waiting to see in her wedding dress.

The day these pictures finally had come out was also the day Gloss _almost_ rebelled for the second time.

Not because they would have to go back into the arena. No. There were enough Victors in District 1 anyway that they might not even be Reaped. And the arena was not such a horrible place, not to Gloss.

Gloss had almost rebelled because Cashmere had _wanted_ to go back in the arena. He wouldn't have minded about going or not but his _sister_ , his baby sister, his strong Victor of a sister who actually preferred volunteering to a glorious and bloody death rather than keeping on living the life of a sex toy in a gilded cage.

Cashmere's pleading eyes had been the only thing keeping him from snapping that day.

What had they done to her?

What had they done that she was actually happy to go back into the arena?

He had never been afraid of the arena. And he knew she wasn't either. They had been groomed to be Victors after all. Killing was what they did best.

But this time they wouldn't be trying to get back out.

Because getting out of the arena would mean being alone for one of them.

And that had been unthinkable.

They would volunteer and never get out of this arena. But they wouldn't go down without a fight.

Weeks and months had passed and soon Reaping Day had arrived.

Without any surprise nobody had opposed their volunteering. Of course not. They would make too good of a show to pass up.

Without surprise either Enobaria and Brutus had also volunteered. Gloss hadn't known their reason but he was glad they had: the Victors from 2 would kill them with respect.

Gloss had almost laughed when the Victors had gathered and prepared themselves for the Opening ceremony. They were grotesque. Ugly. Not meant to be paraded like this.

They were all turned into some kind of joke up until the last moment. Finnick had been just a piece of juicy meat to be ogled and disrespected even as he rode to his death. Mags and Woof were too old to be put in costume with any hope of retaining even a shred of dignity. The Morphlings had barely been aware of what was happening.

Gloss had been disgusted by what was done to them.

Gloss has always respected all the Victors for their strength to survive where and when 23 other people couldn't. He had been raised and taught to respect and honor strength and vigor; qualities all Victors should show.

Few of them had earned Gloss' _profound_ respect. Cashmere, Enobaria, Brutus, Finnick but also Beetee and Wiress, surprisingly enough.

At first Gloss and Cashmere had despised them but year after year the siblings had discovered in the weird tandem an inner strength that they had grudgingly come to respect. These two had always been nice to Gloss and Cashmere despite knowing what they had to do and the fact that they came from 1; and for that Gloss respected them tremendously.

Gloss had already slipped deeper into his Victor mode by then and decided to forget his friendship with Finnick, the only one he felt true and deep friendship for. He knew he would be returned the favor. But Gloss never forgot his respect for him. Finnick was a perfect Victor. Strong and fierce and the epitome of what a Victor should be. He ought to be respected, not exposed to the raving eyes of fools who couldn't see honor when it slapped them in the face.

When District 12's chariot had come out of the stables and flames had engulfed the Victors Gloss had instantly respected them. They had been fierce and detached from the crowds that were so far beneath them they hadn't even deserve a glance.

They were what Victors should be like.

Her in particular.

She had been breathtaking, clothed in her fire.

Not particularly beautiful – Gloss knew a lot about beauty; but breathtaking anyway.

She had outshone them all.

Whoever that mellow girl on the Victory Tour had been she was nowhere to be seen then.

Gloss couldn't help but think that Katniss Everdeen would have made a perfect District 1 Victor.

He had wondered if she would still be that strong in the arena. After all, she was so new it wasn't even funny.

In the following days Gloss and Cashmere had learned a bit more about the young couple. Peeta was decent with a spear but was definitely no Brutus. Katniss was quiet and reserved, distrustful of others.

Cashmere had quickly lost interest.

Gloss had kept observing her, though.

She was really good with knives and in survival skills. Not with making friends. He could see that. She wouldn't have lasted a year in the Capitol with that attitude.

Her or her family, whichever would have given first.

When people had gathered around the shooting station to observe her, Gloss had followed. He had watched her as she completely lost herself to the thrill of the hunt.

He could see it now. She was a hunter. A true hunter. She was meant to have a bow in her hand. He could see it her movements and her face and her eyes.

She hadn't won by accident.

She would definitely have made a great District 1 Victor.

Brutus and Enobaria had requested her as an ally.

Gloss and Cashmere hadn't. The only allies they had agreed to have were Brutus and Enobaria. They were the only ones they trusted enough to kill them when it would be time.

A few days later Katniss Everdeen had made Gloss frown once again when she pulled a 12 at the training score. A 12!

Who was this girl?!

What had she done to get a 12?!

That petite girl had become more than a problem. Or even a surprise.

In that moment, out of the blue, when Cashmere was still gaping at the "12" on the screen, Gloss had thought of Haymitch Abernathy.

How he had snorted when Claudius Templesmith had commented on Katniss burning out in her first Games.

That crafty old man had seen it all even before the gong of the 74th Games had sounded.

 _Almost chopped my fingers off on the train._

Gloss hadn't believed him.

He definitely believed him now.

Haymitch Abernathy had seen a year ago that this girl would make the world burn.

Before even knowing it Gloss was smiling at Caesar Flickerman, all eyes and cameras on him. On this stage, in that moment, Gloss was not a tribute. He was not a whore, he was not from District 1, he was not a mentor.

He was Gloss, Victor of the Hunger Games; and he was forced to voluntarily go back into the arena.

As he watched all the Victors walk and talk to Caesar, he couldn't help but feel something awake inside of him. Something from deep within. Something smoldering and boiling.

He had paid close attention to his fellow Victors and tributes.

Gloss had, for the first time, felt a deep connection with the other Victors.

Betrayal.

They had been betrayed by the Capitol. All of them.

And they weren't happy.

Then there she was. In her perfect wedding dress, covered in pearls and diamonds from District 1. The perfect bride. The perfect Capitol Victor. The perfect puppet.

Gloss had felt betrayed by her in that instant.

Then she had twirled.

She had twirled and twirled and twirled and the pearly diamond dress was on fire.

Gloss had been electrified. Like one the Victors had inhaled a sharp breath when she had opened her wings.

She had set them free.

In that beautiful, perfect moment, Katniss Everdeen had burnt Gloss' slavery away and breathed life back into him with her chin held high and her unwavering eyes staring straight at the camera, deep into the heart of anyone watching.

Gloss hadn't been too sure what he was doing with his hands in the air on Caesar' stage but it had felt right. So deeply right. More right than anything he had ever done in his life before.

His insides were soaring.

He was alive.

More alive in that one moment than in his whole life.

As Gloss' blade slits open the throat of a woman who had always been nice to him, he knows that he hasn't really lived.

Not really.

Not compared to that feeling he had felt so deeply two days before, breathing as one with all the Victors, the eyes of Panem fixed on them, on their joined hands.

Gloss sees her notch an arrow on her bow even before he is done opening gentle Wiress' throat, cutting her sweet song as it floats away on the stifling air of the arena.

Gloss, warm blood covering his hands, realizes that he has been played again.

He was never free. He was never strong. He has never lived.

He has been a Victor but never a winner.

He had thought he had been set free by the burning bird on the stage full of light.

But he has locked himself up in his cage again when he cut gentle Wiress' song for the eyes of a government that had all but killed his sister the day she was born.

He wishes, hopes that Cashmere will forgive him.

He knows he won't have to wait long for her, wherever they were going.

If Gloss has one regret as the arrows flies through the air, it is to never have lived, truly lived his life.

As the tip of the arrow enters his temple Gloss cannot help but be happy that he is dying at the hands of Katniss Everdeen, strong and respected Victor of the Hunger Games, whoever she is.


End file.
